How to Create a Dragon
by NF15617
Summary: Everyone knows the story of Hiccup and Toothless uniting the races, but what about the dragons. How could mother nature allow such perfect predators to exist for more than 300 years? Where did these dragons originate from? Mostly movie based. Sort of a prequel to the film with an overlap into the movie. Pairing is non-sexual Toothless/Hiccup. R&R Might change to M in later chapters
1. Chapter 1

Author notes: This is my first ever published story. As such I do not expect anything perfect and I'm really only posting it here for the fun of it. As for the content of this story, well, it is my version of the movie involving the creation of the dragon race by the Norse gods Thor and Loki. This is NOT a crossover with the Avengers movie though if you want you can picture those two as they appear in the movie. The only thing that is from the Stan Lee version of Thor is the concept of the Odinsleep which plays a minor role in the story. The eventual pairing will be a human Hiccup (Movie age 15) and a redesigned feral Toothless. this may contain Yaoi between the two, I haven't decided yet. This is mostly going to be an adventure/action story but may touch on the romance side as well. This story also contains a fair amount of violence and blood, nothing too graphic, just be aware. I can and will update this story as often as my motivation allows, reviews and private messages are welcome. The inspiration for this story came from Spidermaster and his HTTYD fic, Call of The Night, you should check it out if you want a really good read.

* * *

It was a special night in the high realm of Asgard, home of the gods. Tonight was the commemoration feast that the Allfather, Odin, had arranged to celebrate the second century of Men being in Midgard. This was one of Odin's many feasts throughout the year but it was one where he was given a proper reason to boast that Men were the greatest beings on Midgard and how he had defeated the father of the frost giants, Ymir, and in doing so had created Midgard where Men held unchallenged dominance over all the other creatures. Attendance to this feast was mandatory for all the immortals, not that they would've passed up the food and drink given the choice, and in due time they all arrived at the mead hall. While many of the immortals were merry and happily attended the commemoration feast, there were two who were extremely fed up with Odin's boasts and wished for nothing more than to silence the old god for a few moments. Thor and Loki being Odin's favorite and the most reprimanded gods respectfully, had listened to that tale of how the Allfather had beaten Ymir so much that they almost knew the story better than he did. Thor, the god of thunder, being Odin's favorite had been forced to hear his stories every time he did something that made Odin proud – not a hard thing for the god to do – and as such he had heard it used in comparison to his own accomplishments. Loki, the god of mischief and temptation, was always cast as the "bad seed" and so every time he was caught doing something wrong he was treated to a lengthy and boring lecture by Odin that ultimately resulted in Odin talking about how Loki should try to be more like himself when he slew Ymir or traded his eye or any number of other accomplishments. It was because of these lectures that Loki devised a plan to undermine what the 'perfect' Odin had achieved, but for this radical plan to work Loki needed the power of another immortal.

As the feast progressed Odin had become increasingly intoxicated and had just recently started shouting his stories to everyone in the hall, "And then, with one mighty blow, I felled the giant Ymir and the battle was over! I wasn't done with the swine yet though, from his body I created the foundations for Midgard and provided a place for Ymir's final creations to live!" He went on to describe how even though he had not directly created man, he was the one who allowed them to live and even provided a place for them to do so. "And now, 100 years to the day, we feast here to recognize the second century of man and with them the confirmation that all of _my_ efforts have not been wasted!" He raised his ale horn to take another drink but long before the mead could touch his mouth, he was asleep, passed out dead drunk at his seat.

Thor, who had tried to dampen the sound of Odin with his helmet, relaxed and soon decided that he'd had enough of this feast and slipped out of the hall into the night air. "_Finally some peace and quiet, that old god has got to be the largest container of hot air this side of the realms. One of these days he is going to stop with all his talk, all I have to do is wait, but for how long, even I don't know._" He was so preoccupied with his thoughts that he didn't notice that Loki had approached him from behind and was standing next to him looking at the sky.

"I also have grown very weary of the Allfather's constant ramblings Thor." Had he not been the incarnation of thunder, lightning, and general manliness Thor would've jumped at the sudden and unexpected noise of the speech. As it was his eyes widened a fraction as he turned to face Loki. "What are you talking about Loki? I just came out here to stretch my legs and enjoy the night air before rejoining the feast." Loki smiled at the pathetic evasion and simply replied "Oh come now Thor, anyone with eyes could see that you are fed up with Odin's old war stories and you know what? So am I, I'm sick of his lectures, I just want to find a way to reduce his ego a few notches and hopefully shut him up for a while." Thor's mind was racing as Loki finished, "_knock his ego down a bit eh? How would that work then? What does he get out of this? Is it even possible?"_ After a few minutes of silent contemplation he uttered one word, "How?" Loki's smile grew, if possible, even wider and he responded calmly "I have a plan to change the mortal lives in Midgard, all I need to enact it is the assistance of another immortal from one of the three higher realms."

Thor felt the grim weight of fate on his shoulders as he considered this new development. Even knowing just the barest facts of Loki's plan was enough to shock him into silence. He wouldn't have expected this, not even from Loki, the Allfather had forbidden anyone other than himself to interfere with Midgard and even his incursions were slight at best! Thor gazed at Loki with new eyes and noticed that his smile had vanished while waiting for Thor's response. "This plan will go in direct opposition to Odin's orders but I am willing to hear more, I'm not saying yes, just that I want a better explanation of your plan".

Loki nodded once and began to talk in a charismatic tone, "Of all the droning tales that Odin tells, the one that he seems most fond of is the one where he allowed the race of Man to be the dominant beings in Midgard. I am thinking that together with another immortal, i.e. you, we could create a whole new race, one that would be a threat to the world of Man. Once they start to die off and fear sinks its teeth into their minds they will not be quite so mighty anymore. They will cower in their little shelters and pray to Odin to save them, just think, his greatest achievements on their knees groveling for a chance at salvation!" Loki concluded with a small laugh and looked expectantly at Thor.

For his part Thor was impressed with Loki's plan, it was genius! While he had no idea how to create a whole new race, the notion of it was impressive at the least. Then again Loki was the patron of trickery and wrongdoing after all, so that might be a key factor, it was just his thing. Thor still had three questions fermenting in his head though and as interesting as this plan was he knew better than to go into such an arrangement with Loki half blind. "Well Loki, I must admit that your plan is an intriguing one, there are however, three questions you must answer first." Loki simply gestured for Thor to proceed with a confidant smile.

"First, what type of creatures do you plan on creating in Midgard?"

"That, my dear Thor, depends on who I get as an ally. If it is you then I was thinking something along the lines of a larger snake type creature with the sturdiness of your warrior build and the powers of your thunder and lightning. Basically giant reptiles with the ability to fly, create fire, possessing the strength of four men and certainly a large boost of intelligence from yours truly." Thor nodded his agreement with this answer. "Your next question then, if you please."

"Secondly, how violent are these winged beasts going to be? As much as I want to deal a blow to Odin I cannot condone the slaughter of an entire race not in a war to do so."

Loki's expression became very serious for a brief time as he considered the objection before he responded. "I understand your sentiments Thor, and in order to prevent that unhappy outcome I shall do two things. First, I shall modify their behavior to be mostly antisocial and inclined to small groups of no more than ten at best. This will prevent them from turning into a large group that could rein death and woe upon Midgard. Second and just to compensate for the first choice I shall make their blood thirst higher than any creature in Midgard save for the innate destructive nature of Man, this will allow them to survive alone but not make them so violent that they can't control themselves from killing each other. Will that satisfy you Thor?"

Thor gave a curt nod and was about to speak when he was interrupted by the not so quite sounds of Odin yelling in the mead hall again. "We must hurry and finish this business Loki the windbag has woken up and will soon be looking for me, if he's not too drunk." Loki agreed and asked Thor to voice his last concern.

"The last issue is the most important one Loki. If I was to join with you and enact this plan and we created these beings, how are we going to hide them from the Allfather, much less get them into Midgard and protect them from him while they mature and multiply?"

Loki's smile returned to his face as he answered, "That's the easy part Thor; we simply wait for his next Odinsleep to create the species then, once he wakes, we use the bridge of the world tree to transport them to Midgard. As you know the bridge is powered by his energy and if we can send enough of these creatures across it he will fall into the deepest Odinsleep ever recorded. He will eventually reawaken but that will be many decades later and by then the beasts will have grown so numerous that they will be too ingrained for any immortal to externally remove without destroying the balance of Midgard."

Thor thought over what Loki had said several times before finally speaking. Having decided he proclaimed his choice. "Very well Loki, I shall give you a majority of my power to help give life and might to these creatures. If you are caught know that I will not be the one punished and know also that should this plan succeed then you will have my thanks for silencing that old pair of bellows." With that Thor raised his ever present hammer, Mjolnir, in front of him and began transfer his power into it. Lightning arced around the pair with ever increasing speed as the power grew, as it was nearing dangerous levels the arc condensed into a semi-solid sphere of lightning that enclosed the pair with a thrum of force. Just when it seemed as though the lightning would surge out of control and destroy everything within the sphere it all froze, as if time itself had halted, and was drawn down into Mjolnir. The metal of the weapon was covered in what looked like an entire storm of lightning but it was contained a few inches from the metal and raced around arcing inside the invisible barrier. Loki took the massive tool and with a wave of his hand, transported it to his private magical forge deep under the castle.

Thor collapsed and fell down on one knee; never had a feat taken so much energy from the god but it would be well worth it. Recovering, Thor said, "I think I have thought up a name for these winged reptiles, dragons, it seems fitting that they should have a name that describes the amount of effort that was put into their creation."

Loki gave Thor a small amused smile and replied, "If that is what you want to call them then I can hardly argue with you after your contribution to my plan. Very well in honor of that massive amount of power you stored in Mjolnir, dragons they shall be; though I can't follow your logic with the naming." With that Loki vanished in a cloud of green and black vapor.

Moments later Loki appeared in his forge and began to think about the specific details of these 'dragons'. "_Now then, how am I going to craft the perfect beats to take Man's spot at the top? I guess I'll start with the preparations." _Loki then went over to his working desk and pulled out a few dozen blank sheets of paper and some ink. Thus armed Loki began to make notes and sketches of his soon-to-be killers.

Over the next 10 years, by Midgard reckoning, Loki devoted every spare moment to his labors, his plan, and the careful watching of the Allfather for any sign of the Odinsleep's coming. Then one night at the normal evening meal, the Allfather seemed to drift off in a kind of haze for a handful of seconds, the ever watchful Loki picked up on this and after the meal went to find Thor… the time had come.

* * *

Author note: Thank you for reading I hope that you enjoyed it. This story is already written up to 13.5K words and will be updated as soon as I polish it and convert it into a chapter format. Reviews are welcome, if you have any questions please send me a private message for a fast answer or leave it in a review for an answer in the next chapter. if your question is refering to what the contents of the rest of the story will be, just know that I will not put the following subjects into this story:

1 No male pregnancy, there are plenty of other fics with this in them

2 no anthro/female toothless, again other fics just not this one

3 Hiccup will not be a little whiny bitch that toothless uses as a sex toy

4 Astrid will be violent but not the extent of being crazy

5 Hiccup will not be turning into a dragon. - Notice the period, enough said


	2. Chapter 2

Author note: Chapter two is here finally. Once again reviews are welcome, any questions about the story can be submitted via a private message or review. The whole section of this story is not heavy on descriptions due to how long that would make this part of the plot. On to the story, please enjoy.

* * *

Loki finally found Thor at the entrance to his personal forge of magic.

For his part Thor was very excited at the signs forming around Odin, he had also barely managed to pick up on the brief disconnection that Odin had shown. He nodded to Loki and the two gods descended into the forge together.

Loki was the first to speak,

"Well partner, it appears that the time has come. We must now begin to forge our creations with the utmost haste."

Thor was of the same mind as Loki.

"Yes we must do it now before the Odinsleep sets in so that we can be sure to have enough time to finish. I can hide the dragons when they're in the first stages of creation but if Odin wakes before we finish then I dare not think what he will do to us when he finds out."

Without another word the two started, in the last few years Loki had described what each type of dragon was to be like and how each dragon was designed to counter a specific tactic that the mortals might use to try and save themselves, but each dragon had the same basic features.

All of the dragons were reptiles and as such were cold blooded but for all the ones that could breathe fire; the flame would be like a small heat source that would never run out except in the event of death. For those who could not, their scales would protect them. They would all have fangs and many would have claws, while others would have unique hides that could do everything from cutting down trees, to camouflage. By far the most unique feature of the dragon race was the ability of every dragon to communicate on a nonverbal level with each other using their minds. This form of bonding would be essential to the dragons' ability to hunt, kill, reproduce, and work as a small group.

Thor and Loki started by molding small scale models, about the size of hand, of each dragon out of a special type of soft metal, most of the supplying duties fell to Thor as he was the muscle of the pair while the crafting and detail work was given to Loki as his devious fingers and sharp mind were ideal for such tasks. The day quickly passed into night as the pair toiled on their project.

The duo worked all through the night and until noon of the third day, it was a long haul with much effort, but they finally finished all 160 models, 80 species of dragons, a male and female of each.

Loki coughed and spoke

"Well *cough* we finally finished them. I suggest that you rest for a few hours before trying to grant them life."

Thor looked like he wanted to protest but just nodded abruptly and went to go lay down to restore his energy.

As he laid his head down to recover Thor thought about how he and Loki were the two immortals who never seemed to get along well, and yet here he was preparing to try and give life to a creation of Loki's that would, in all probability, cause much pain and suffering to Midgard. Did he really hate the Allfather talking about his victories enough to do this? Was something else at work here?

As Thor drifted off to sleep he had the vague notion that things were not right and that he should question Loki about it later. just as he reached that conclusion, sleep claimed him and wiped all thoughts from his mind.

Thor returned to the forge 30 hours later, back to his full power again. Loki noticed him the moment he stepped through the door and spoke in a rushed manner,

"Good you're back, then we can start to give these pretty dragons life. I thought that you should use Mjolnir and channel the forces of lightning, thunder and your own raw power to the central pit in the forge and I will mix and match the various dragons with the power that they need. Changing the nature of things is my specialty after all."

Thor nodded his agreement and picked up the power infused hammer and started pouring the streams of power into the central forge. Bolt after bolt fired from the metal hammer into the center of the forge and a small mass of what looked like indigo magma began to take shape; there was a thin mist of green energy that Loki had put in place, when he created the forge to contain whatever forces he worked with in the forge, covering the mass of Thor's power.

Loki settled down at his crafting station after arranging the lifeless metal figures and began his work.

What followed thereafter Thor was never able to accurately remember as he was too focused on making sure that the power contained within Mjolnir was regulated so as not to cause any abnormalities in the mass that he was forming.

Loki put on a pair of magical gloves that allowed him to extract and manipulate not only the three types of power contained within the forge, but also to fuse the effects that those forces had in Midgard into the dragon figures. These gloves were not what allowed him to manipulate Thor's power but they did serve as a powerful shield that would allow him to work with such massive quantities of energy for extended periods of time. He used some of the lightning to give all the dragons the ability to produce heat; the qualities of thunder were used to give each dragon a distinctive 'voice' of rage and dominance. The raw power of Thor was used to bestow upon the dragons unparalleled stamina, great strength, and high pain tolerance.

It was a few hours into the work when Thor noticed something that gave him pause and turned his blood to ice; there was a slight tremor that traveled throughout the forge. The Allfather had awoken from the Odinsleep! Loki also noticed the slight reverberation throughout the room that always signaled the awakening of Odin. Thor immediately stopped channeling the power from Mjolnir into the forge, it was nearly depleted anyway and instead focused that remaining power outwards, forming a protective bubble that would shield the two gods and their work from Odin's all-seeing eye for a short time.

Loki, knowing that both his time and magic he had to work with was limited, began to cut corners on the last several dragons. He was forced to make a few sacrifices such as reducing the armored dragon's speed and wing size, while using that speed to increase the reproductive yield of the smallest dragon and buffing up the wingspan and mobility of some of the more dangerous ones. He figured it was better to have one or two that were so insanely overpowered that they would be nigh impossible to beat without massive amounts of help.

When he was almost finished he glanced up at Thor whose eyes were tight shut in concentration trying to keep the shield active.

_Perfect, he's so distracted that I'll be able to make a few modifications with my own power to this one._

He thought as he quickly reached for the largest dragon, in so doing however, he knocked the lifeless female model of one of the dragons from the worktable, when it struck the ground it bent and cracked along one side. Loki cursed to himself and then proceeded to modify the largest dragon to suit his true purpose.

He had just finished putting the final touches on the large dragon when he heard a groan emanate from Thor, the shield dome was broken and with that, time was now up. He still had one dragon that wasn't yet complete but it mattered not as he had his trump card and anyway that incomplete dragon was the male version of the destroyed female figure and wouldn't have survived in Midgard without its female counterpart to reproduce with. Working quickly Loki fashioned a protective container from his special gloves and the almost depleted supply of the forge's magic, he then made his way, alone, to the bridge between the realms. He made his way out of the forge leaving the drained, unconscious Thor behind; his number one priority was to get the dragons through the gate to Midgard before he was stopped by Odin.

* * *

Author's note: well there is chapter two done, sorry if it seems like a bit of a cliffhanger. reviews are once again welcome. Any questions can be submitted via a review or private message. One piece of explanation though, the metal dragons have been given the qualities of lightning and thunder. this means that they can do things that lightning can do i.e under the right conditions lightning can start a fire hence the ability of most dragons to breath/create fire. This will become more important later on I just couldn't find a good way to incorporate this into this chapter.

The next chapter will be posted sometime before the end of this week, look forward to it.


	3. Chapter 3

AN: Chapter three, firstly a slight warning of some violence in this chapter nothing graphic just thought I'd mention it. Also I received a guest review on chapter two about the accuracy of the version of Norse mythology used thus far. I would like to thank that person for taking the time to write the review and my reply is that due to their relative unimportance in the overall plot of this story, the specifics of the workings of Asgard and its denizens were never intended to be overly detailed or complex. So without any more rambling on to Chapter three. Enjoy!

* * *

To call the pathway between the realms a gate is a bit misleading, for though it did functions as a transport system, it was actually the large world tree, Ygdrasil, and its branches that connected the realms. Each of the branches was insubstantial and was connected to the three high realms by an archway of beaten gold.

Loki was in a hurry, he crossed to the arch in record time but he still wasn't fast enough to beat Odin there. The Allfather was standing at the entrance to the branch of Ygdrasil, with a look of fury on his face. He spoke in a terrible voice that made Loki's bones rattle and his ears twinge with pain.

"Loki! Just what do you think you are doing with that container? What are you up to Loki? Are you trying to interfere with the other realms?"

Before Odin had finished his questions Loki was already moving, angling to try and throw the container past Odin onto the pathway, for he knew that once something is set on that path it doesn't stop until it reaches its destination.

Odin, being the great warrior that he was, read through Loki's movements and drew his sword intending to sever Loki's head from his body. Normally it would've been no contest and Loki would have been struck down, however Odin had just woken up and as such he was not back at full power yet and so when he swung his weapon Loki was able to divert the blow. He was not fast enough though and the blow still severed his forearms and with them still clutching the container full of the metal dragons just waiting to be given a chance on Midgard. The odd mass sailed right through the gateway and the effect was immediate. A great shock wave rippled out and blasted Loki back while Odin's face drained of color from the sudden loss of energy used in sending so much power through the gateway.

Each of the three high realms was required to have a gateway to prevent its power from leaving in excessive amounts. The amount of energy required from Odin to maintain the gateway was high it was meant to discourage the leader of the realm from overusing the archway. When the leader wanted to send anything or anyone through the portal they normally had to sacrifice 90% of power just to make the trip. Loki was under the mistaken impression that Odin only made small changes to Midgard because of his concern for the lesser realm, but really it wasn't _possible_ for Odin to make larger changes without an impractical amount of energy expenditure. This was the first time that an unrestricted amount of immortal energy had passed through the portal and it should have robbed Odin of all of his immortal powers for hundreds of years. Fortunately enough only Loki's arms went through and so Odin was spared from this outcome but the toll it exacted on him was enormous never the less.

It was at this point that Thor arrived, having gotten his energy back, only to find that Loki was laughing manically, Odin was back in the Odinsleep and he now found that he no longer trusted Loki quite as much as he had while helping him with the plan. It was as though a veil had been lifted from over his eyes and he was able to see the world as it was and he didn't like the way it was looking at the present.

"Loki, what have you done, my head feels like I've been drinking some turned ale and I feel a great sense of doom in the air. You will tell me in full what has happened and why you were laughing so much even after losing your arms."

Loki's laughing having stopped when Thor started speaking, decided that there was no harm in divulging his full plan, now that there was no way to stop it.

Before Loki started talking he decided to mend his limbs. There was a faint ripple as though of a reflection seen through a windblown lake and Loki's arms returned with a blight green flash ending with a slight hiss.

Loki took a moment to work his new arms and once assured that they had been correctly restored he began his explanation to Thor.

"Well, let me start out by saying that I was telling the truth about my plan to weaken Midgard by creating the ultimate enemy for the mortals. I might've downplayed the scale of my ambitions though, for you see, unlike the rest of you I do not enjoy fair fights much. I never intended to simply _reduce_ the population of the mortals; no I want to _eliminate_ the race from Midgard forever!"

Loki started laughing, a cold high pitched sound that Thor hoped he would never hear again.

When Loki's mirth had finally died down Thor retorted,

"Loki don't think that the humans will just roll over and die, in case you've forgotten, I was there when you created the dragons and I saw how you designed them. They are very strong but they would never be able to take down the world of Men as you claim, they are too scattered, independent and relatively peaceful for that level of genocide."

Thor looked at Loki and waited for the truth of his words to sink in, but then something odd happened. Loki stood tall and proud while shaking his finger at Thor,

"tsk tsk Thor, you should know me better than that. I know that almost all of the dragons have those flaws, _almost,_ but there is one exception to that rule. While you were occupied with keeping the anti-detection shield intact I made a few modifications to a single model of the largest dragon. I had limited power to work with but I managed to inject a little flare of my personal power into it. That dragon will be the death of the world, I had to sacrifice its ability to reproduce and its friendly personality but what I got in return made up for those qualities in spades and then some. That special dragon has three unique traits that will bring the world of men straight to their graves!"

Thor stood steadfast as he waited for Loki to explain what made this dragon so special, for he knew that Loki spoke the truth, he had been too concentrated on his shield to pay the other god and heed for a brief time in the forge.

Loki resumed his explanation,

"Firstly Thor, I want to thank you for giving me the idea for the first special quality. In essence I removed all positive emotions from the dragon; she has no concept of happiness and knows only hate, pain, and misery. These negative emotions will make her so aggressive that nothing will be able to withstand her wrath. Secondly she will be immensely strong, this unnatural strength combined with her massive size will mean that she will be able to live for a very long time, it will take so long for her massive amounts of cells to die that by the time enough do, a new cluster will take their place. Finally the best for last, I gave the dragon the ability to force the others to work together as a sort of hive mind. With the force of hundreds if not thousands of her kin acting as a highly mobile army, the mortals don't stand a chance! Just imagine the look on the Allfather's face a few decades from now when the dragons start to make their move, which is assuming he wakes up in time. I can see the despair and carnage in Midgard now, hundreds of thousands of the mortals dying by flame and claw. Not even able to fight back, not even knowing that they are fighting with the perfect killers designed by Loki and powered by Thor. Heck they might even try to pray to you for help Thor and you won't be able to do anything! Ha ha ha!"

Thor had stood perfectly still all throughout Loki's master plan rant; he was frozen partly from shock and partly from wanting to make sure of his feelings before he acted. As Loki's speech drew to a close and he started openly laughing, even mocking, Thor snapped. He was known as the second strongest god in all of Asgard, he was the god of thunder and warriors! And here was this puny little worm making a fool of him, laughing in his face and trying to destroy another realm. The rage that Thor felt towards Loki could not even be described; he just knew that he acted without thought and that it was over before Thor knew what had happened. It was like going to sleep and waking up in the morning feeling like only a few seconds had passed. His entire world was the rage, a feeling of intense exertion and the vague notion of many impacts shaking the ground under his feet.

* * *

AN: once again just a short chapter but it's either this or a very long single chapter. Please review if you have any story related input or otherwise. The next chapter should be up in less than five days.


	4. Chapter 4

**AN:** well here is chapter four and I have decided to just screw it and upload the rest of my story, as far as I've written, today. Please review it really does help. As the next few chapters are going to be packed full of exposition and semi-new information please make sure that you are ready for it. If you find any inconsistencies or have questions write me a review or send a private message. If you have negative complaints about the story please create an account before posting a review so that I can respond to you. Well here is chapter four, enjoy!

* * *

When Thor regained awareness of his surroundings, he noticed that he was still in roughly the same place as before but that he held his hammer by his side and that the laughter of Loki had stopped.

Thor turned his gaze to where he last remembered seeing the joyful god and saw a sight that would haunt him for many nights to come. Where the jubilant immortal had stood, was now home to a crumpled figure with its limbs bent all the wrong ways and pouring blood from its many protruding bones. It wasn't even possible to distinguish that the mass was an immortal anymore. It was at this point that Thor looked down at his hammer, it was stained almost black with the amount of blood that covered it and in fact his armor also bore the sap of Loki's body. He could hear shouting in the distance and glancing back he saw a small group of immortals coming across the field from the main city of Asgard. He took one look around at the situation before making a basic yet cowardly choice, he ran, knowing that they would blame him for what had happened and while perfectly justified, he could not be caught yet. He needed to think of a way to stop Loki's plan before it was too late, this would be tough because he wasn't the brightest bolt in the sky when it came to this type of work.

Within 10 minutes he reached Loki's forge and went inside. The inside of the forge was exactly as he had left it when he went to confront Loki, empty, except for the central pit of magic and Loki's worktable.

Thor paced around the forge and while doing so, thought back to what Loki had said about his modified dragon and how it would lead the charge. About how all of this was made possible by him and everything else he knew about the dragons.

After a few minutes he was brought back to the world when his foot struck something that then flew across the floor. He paused and looked down, it was then that he saw a broken metal figure of a dragon; it was lifeless, lacking the thrum of magic. When he examined it he saw that the damage was too severe for him to mend fast enough, cursing he threw it at a nearby wall where it shattered into tiny pieces.

This was hopeless; there was nothing that he could do, Loki had won and Thor knew it. He sank into the nearest chair and hung his head in defeat; Loki was just too smart there was no way to win. Thor allowed himself one last act of rage before he went to turn himself in for his crimes of helping and then murdering Loki, he smashed the worktable where this had all started and was just on the verge of throwing Loki's notes into the fire when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a faint glimmer.

Thor couldn't believe his eyes, it was a fully formed metal figure and it was undamaged! He quickly rushed over to it and gingerly lifted it. As Thor proceeded to examine it he felt his heart race, for while there was no life in the figure, it had a great structure and seemed to hold immense power, if the lithe shape and huge wings were anything to judge by.

If he had not been a god, Thor would've thanked the divines for this figure. For with its help he might be able to do some good and thus face judgment with the knowledge that he had tried to fix his mistakes. With this figurine he could try to stop Loki's plan, all he had to do was bring it to life and send it to Midgard.

He calmed himself and began to riffle through Loki's notes to see if he could find out what this dragon was going to be. As he looked he saw many of the creatures, spines, horns, cloaks of fire, hot water, sonic pulses, and poison. For all his skimming though he could not locate so much as a drawing of this dragon, perhaps Loki had gotten rid of his notes on this dragon for some reason or maybe the notes never existed in the first place. Whatever the case his plans were unchanged, he began to think what to do,

"_Well then, I'll just have to make you from scratch little friend."_

Thor began to assemble Loki's forge for the creation process.

"_Without Loki's mind to guide my power I have no idea what the end result will be, but I have to try, for the sake of Midgard."_

Thor then began to channel his power through his hammer into the pit of the forge and once it was saturated, began his work.

Before he actually started applying the qualities into the metal figure he thought about how this was going to work out, for god though he was, he did not possess the ability to filter the power down past its original level. He was a god of brawn not wisdom; as such he could create storms, produce lightning and imbue the power of thunder into others giving them increased strength and stamina. He didn't have the ability to change this dragon's mind, he couldn't make it smarter and he couldn't make it all-powerful. In fact he wasn't even sure if this dragon would live long enough to serve its purpose. He shook himself then, now was not the time for doubts, he had sworn to do everything in his power to stop Loki's plan and so he would.

Casting away his doubts he began to extract the power from the forge in workable amounts. His first task was to give this dragon the power of the storm and so he separated a nice chunk of storm based magic from the forge and fed it into the dragon. There was no outward effect but that was normal, as a being designed to inhabit Midgard it would be impossible for it to exhibit any outward signs of life on the higher realm of Asgard. Next Thor worked in as much raw physical power as he thought the small figure could hold. Finally Thor grabbed what magic was left in the forge and mixed it with the blood of Loki that still coated his hammer, all the while hoping that this dragon would be smart enough to combat the rest of its kind and save the humans. While he applied the mixture to the dragon he also tried to funnel his own emotions and fresh lightning into the dragon, for an added spark that none of the others possessed. As he finished, Thor watched the figure intensely knowing that this little thing was his only hope of saving Midgard from a terrible fate. As he looked on and the rest of the power was absorbed into the figure, he could've sworn through the light of the magic, that he saw the metal figurine blink, but then the magic disappeared and the forge was dark once more.

It was done, the dragon was completed, now all that was left to do was send it through the gateway to Midgard and hope that everything turned out for the best.

It was at this point that Thor remembered the figures that he had seen before departing for the forge. Surely they would've reached the gate by now and might've even posted a guard to keep everything away from the portal. He needed to hurry but it would take far too long to get to the gateway from here. Thor knew he had but one choice, he would have to send his hammer, his beloved weapon Mjolnir through the gate with the dragon attached to it.

Having made up his mind he grabbed the hammer and tied the dragon securely to the handle's strap and was just about to throw it when he remembered what Loki had said about how the mortals would lose because they had no information about the dragons and their awesome powers. After considering this statement Thor went to Loki's notes and proceeded to roll them around the hammer's handle, now the humans would not only have a dragon working in their favor, but would also have information to use in their fights with the dragons.

Having felt confident that he had done all he could to try and atone for his mistakes, Thor hurled the hammer out into the open air and directed it towards the gateway,

"_This is in more powerful hands than mine now, I just hope that the dragon is accepted into the World Tree and given life." _

Having completed his task Thor made his way back to the palace where he promptly confessed and accepted his punishment for helping Loki and then killing him. After a speedy trial he was sentenced to confinement in a small cell for life. This sentence would've stood for all time, if it wasn't for the surprise that entered the cell 300 years later; it was a grinning Loki!


	5. Chapter 5

**AN:** Chapter five, enjoy!

* * *

**The night of the creation of the dragons**

**300 years earlier**

Elsewhere, the people of Asgard that Thor had seen finally reached the gate and saw quite a mess. First there was Odin, strongest of the gods, holding his blood spattered sword, out cold on the ground deep in the Odinsleep again. As much as the onlookers wondered about what could possibly have happened to put him back into the Odinsleep mere hours after waking, the sight of what lay next to him drove those questions right out of their minds. For lying in a pool of its own blood was a figure, impossible to tell who, broken to the point of death. Being immortals and loving war the denizens of Asgard were no strangers to violence, but to see someone in this terrible condition shocked them and held their gazes for the longest time. Eventually one of them went and with the help of a few others started to carry Odin back to his place of rest.

Just as they were about to leave one of the group heard a noise, it was quiet but audible, a slight gurgle coming from the broken body. The man quickly walked over to the figure and checked doubtfully for signs of life and to his astonishment; he found them, weak but definitely there. He ran to find a healer, perhaps this poor soul could shed some light on what had transpired here today.

Just as the rest of the group was making their way back to the palace, a whooshing noise was heard, as if an object was moving a great speed through the air. Then, without any warning a large metallic colored object flew past the group and vanished, going past the gateway to the other realms. All was silent except for the slight graying of Odin face as yet more of his energy was used to transport the object to another realm.

**Inside the world tree on the way to Midgard**

The world tree was not really a tree; so much as it was a means of balancing the energy flows and general states of each of the realms, it just happened to look like a tree when viewed as a whole. Therefore there was one rule that all beings traveling though the pathways had to abide by. Nothing from the higher realms could enter the lower realms without losing enough power avoid making an impact on the balance of the realm that they were headed for.

This meant that no god could descend to Midgard in their immortal forms and no mortal could ascend to Asgard without being dead. This was why the gods had never before shown themselves in Midgard as gods and also why any interference from the gods had to be created in an indirect method at a great expenditure of energy, such as the lightning that was attributed, correctly, to Thor's power. This power was part of Odin's human improvement program; he was the one who entered the dreams of certain mortals and convinced them of the existence of the gods and the realms. After that he simply required a small portion of magic from each immortal to act as a 'seed' and grow with the faith of the humans to allow him to make simple changes to Midgard every few decades or so.

As soon as Loki's container cleared the gate it was disintegrated and the metal figures were sent flying onto the pathway, bound for Midgard. Loki had known about the tree and its rule, thus he had taken the precautions that saved the dragons from being destroyed as the threat to Midgard that they were. He made sure not to use any of the power to create life in them, no outward or inward signs of life. There was only the _suggestion_ of life within each of the metal figures. As the group traveled along the pathway it reached a certain point, a vast barrier that glowed with the light of ten thousand stars. As the metal statues passed through this barrier, a change began to take place. The minds of each of the creatures was given the spark of intelligence that was gifted to them by Loki, some had a stronger spark than others but all were relatively the same, with the exception of one, the largest dragon that Loki had modified had a mental spark that seemed as bright as a candle compared to the sparks of its kin.

As the myriad of dragons continued down the pathway so too did their minds grow, each species developed key survival instincts that were unique to each dragon, as well as various generalized fears, wants, and needs. As the dragons neared what could be called the trunk of the world tree, the first physical signs of life began to manifest. These signs were small at first, a wing movement here, a blinked eye there; but again just as with their minds each of the meal figures slowly began to change. The metal of their bodies disappeared leaving only a glowing red outline of each dragon, and then the outlines began to fill with substance. First the bones groaned into place and hardened. Next came the nerves and internal organs, each dragon with the exception of a few was given a magical repository for the ability to convert Thor's lightning, with Loki's magic, into flame. Finally the muscles and flesh were formed, to protect the dragon from injury a thick coating of scales was draped over each.

As the group of fully formed dragons neared the realm of Midgard one more important event occurred. Due to Loki's container, the world tree had the 'thought' that this new race was helpless and in need of protection, rather than being the insanely dangerous predators that they were, and so to preserve the balance and give these new creatures a chance at survival, the tree created five eggs for each pair of male and female dragons. The sole exception to this gift was the single female who didn't have a male counterpart; she was probably going to die sooner rather than later.

Just as the last egg was formed the gatherings of dragons reached the realm of Midgard and were sent hurtling out like a meteor shower and impacted with the large sheets of ice that were commonplace in the north of the world. When they woke the next day, none of the dragons had any idea who or what they were, or how they'd gotten to be where they were now. The side effect of traveling through the world tree is that you lose all memory of your travel unless you are protected by your own internal magic.

**Midgard (Earth) shortly after impact, a nondescript northern glacier **

The dragons awoke slowly and began to gaze around at the bleak landscape. It was utterly white with some overcast clouds and a hard surface that would normally have been slick but was easy for their claws to grip. As they roamed about the place they began to get a grasp of their bodies, muscles, senses, and most importantly their minds.

For, just as a newborn baby is clumsy and doesn't know much of anything beyond its most basic needs, so too were the dragons confused about what was going on. For though the world tree had given them the spark of life, it had not provided them with any other information about what and who they were, for a time all was confusion as each dragon wrestled with itself to try and divine a greater meaning to its life. None succeeded, as all were too new to the world to answer, or even correctly ask, such deep questions as who they were and why they were where they were. They couldn't even speak yet, at least not in a traditional way, they quickly discovered that they could convey a series of impressions and broad feelings to the others in their group but it was still on a limited level.

As the whole intimacy of their mental links was so new most of the dragons felt the urge to just concern themselves with their own lives and not to tap into the lives of the others.


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: **starting to get into the _heavy_ stuff with this chapter. Enjoy and review.

* * *

This chaos persisted for the longest time, until one of the dragons made a breakthrough and found that she was able to use her mind better than her peers. After a few hours of work the largest female dragon had a decent handle on her mental abilities, she had even started to communicate with some of those nearest to her. She was still not able to form speech but she was able to strongly convey what she wanted others to know. With this newfound channel of conversing she began to try and teach the others how to 'talk' with their kin. She quickly discovered that none of her brethren had the ability to communicate on her level and none could truly refuse her contact, there were some that were able to put up simple protection but that was nothing to the force of her will when she applied it. She withdrew into herself for a while, thinking of what the best way to bring them together would be. Whilst in the midst of her plans, two things happened in quick succession; first was that she felt a slight emptiness inside her and it was a little painful, second was that her tongue licked the inside of her mouth and brushed her teeth. In that single moment it all became clear to her!

Her new plan was simple; if the others couldn't talk on her level then she would link them together through herself. Just like the tongue was the center point of the mouth and could reach out to all of her teeth and ensure that they were in working order, so too would she be at the center of the group working to make sure that they were all safe and happy during the transitions that they all faced.

As she began her task she quickly noticed that, without exception, all of the minds around her were dim and dull compared to her own, she could overpower them all if she chose. She could rule these lesser minds

"_And why shouldn't I? Every group needs a leader, and who is more suited to this task than me? If one of these pitiful creatures took charge it would lead to disaster and chaos for the group."_

It was during this silent contemplation that a slight pain had begun to rise in her midsection, as the light in the sky began to fade the pain grew more and more in intensity until it manifested itself into a thought.

This thought entered the mind of the female dragon and began to talk to her, speaking of the need for nourishment and of how to obtain it. All the while the pain it caused waxed ever greater until it covered the landscape of the poor dragon in swirls of hunger and the need to stop the pain. For her part all that the dragon was aware of was the sound of another voice in her head that seemed to have neither body or source, it was just there.

When she briefly tried to find out more information about this voice that was trying to get her to do bad things and hurting her, all she could make out was the vague image of a dark green almost black figure that seemed to be composed of condensed vapor rather than scales and sinew.

As she watched it slowly gained more mass and definition as it turned to face her. Suddenly as she located the source her surroundings changed, gone were the other dragons and their eggs and in their place was, nothing, an endless void of white with no shadows or clear light source. The only thing that seemed to be with her in this strange, new place was the odd figure that she had observed earlier. Since it was the only other thing in her immediate vicinity, she turned to stare questioningly at the figure.

Two bright green orbs appeared in the middle of the uppermost part of the creature's body. As they swiveled to stare at her the young dragon had an overwhelming urge to obey, to do whatever those bright green eyes wanted her to do. She couldn't explain it anymore than you could explain why you swing your arms when walking, but _something_ in her just told her to listen to what this unformed mass of vapor communicated.

As soon as she reached that conclusion the mass began to change rapidly from just a blob into something else entirely.

The blob contracted and formed a new shape, about as thick around as her but at least half her height if not smaller. From there the wide stubby mass started to have pieces fall away from the base up. First the lower section split into two equal sized protrusions each with a wide, flat base. This split continued until about half way up the figure.

The next thing to change was that the outermost sides of the top half were stretching outwards and becoming two new protrusions, similar to the previous ones but slightly thinner and with the ends forming into round balls that then were formed into five smaller digits of different lengths.

The next feature to appear was that the top of the being started to break off and shed many layers until nothing remained except a small oval shaped ball that was set at an odd angle attached to the rest of the figure by a small amount of the mass. The next thing that she noticed was a horizontal slit in the sphere on the top, it was small but no less distinct as it ran along the lower half of the ball and stopped about two inches from the edges and began to open and close at varying speeds. Lastly those eyes that had previously been in the blob form materialized in the top section of the sphere. They were space such that five of them could fit across the frontal surface of the sphere and that there was one eye's worth of distance between the two eyes.

As she looked on with what she thought was a puzzled expression, the eye too began to undergo a slight alteration. The shape turned from oval and huge to smaller and spherical. Those silted pupils shortened until the pupil became a little circle in the center of the eyes. The total green started to recede from the edges towards the middle and eventually formed a ring around the pupil. Where the green used to be, white took over, covering a good half of the eyes.

Just as the very confused dragon thought that it was over, the crack in the sphere started to move again only this time it began to make the strangest of sounds. Afterwards she could never fully describe what the sounds were but they were high pitched and long with a few lower sounds spread throughout them and they lasted a good five minutes.

Finally after the sounds stopped she plucked up the nerve to draw nearer to the figure despite the mild pain that movement caused her.

When she drew to within a claws reach, the figure eyes, which had been closed, opened and stared at her with the oddest look she had ever seen. They seemed at once incredibly sad and yet inexpressibly happy at the same time. Putting the look aside she decided to try talking to it in the hopes that it might be able to explain the strange pains that she was having or who and what it was.

_Hello? Can you understand me?_

The figure's stare did not fade but it made what she took as an affirmative sound and that was good enough for the distressed female. She breathed a wondrous sigh of relief and began to bombard the strange creature with many questions.

_So you can understand me after all, I'm so glad that someone can! So I have a myriad of questions, what are you? Who are you? Where are we right now? Do you know what this strange bad feeling in my body is? And why can none of my kin unde-_

She was abruptly cut off as the green mist took two steps forwardand struck her across her jaw hard enough to send her sprawling on the floor, she stayed there feeling new pain radiate from her jaw, tendrils of dark green mist seeped from the floor and worked their way around her fore and hind paws, her tail and her still sore mouth. The mist, while seeming just vapor was actually very solid and try as she might she couldn't break free from her bonds. The poor immobilized female looked up at the green figure with confusion as it moved towards her once again.

"Well,it seems as though your development was better than I had expected though your thoughts and personality are going to require some serous _repairing_ if you are going to serve your purpose."

The green figure spoke with a cool and calm voice but it carried a hint of power underneath the outer smoothness.

"Thankfully the container protected mefrom the gaze of the world tree; otherwise all of this would've been a total waste."

The dragon didn't understand what was going on and she tried to ask another question but the tendril around her muzzle prevented more than a few weak sounds.

"It seems as though the tree took exception to the traits that he had planned for you though and suppressed them. No matter no matter, I will just have to reach down and bring them out again."

He smiled while looking down at her like she was some kind of interesting creature.

"First things first though, I think you wanted some answers correct?"

He pressed on without waiting for an answer that would never have come,

"I'm not going to tell you everything but I will tell you enough to get you to listen to me as I instruct you on how to survive."

After he finished talking he walked a few paces away and sat in a strange structure that had appeared from nothing, it had four base parts with a place for him to rest his back on.

"To answer your first question I must first tell you what you are, you and those under you have been given the title of dragons, do not ask me why I have no idea, it's just what you are called. You were created by someone not from this place, for the sake of your understanding and sanity; let's just call him The Creator."

"Now that you know that much you should be able to handle what I am, I am a portion of the Creator's will and power that was given life just as you were, through the world tree, but more on that part later. I have no proper name but given my purpose of steering you and vicariously the others, toward survival you can just call your teacher."

"Now that you know a bit about yourself and quite enough about me, I believe your next question dealt with where we are right now. A natural question for any sane creature, to want to know its surroundings at all times, I suppose that this place could technically be called 'you' but for our purposes let's call this your mind space."

"Once you have trained your mind this space can become any place that you want it to be the only reason that it looks like a giant white void right now is because you have landed in a snow field and have no memory of other places to draw upon."

"As for that pain in your body that is a combination of the strain of me holding you mind here and a feeling of hunger induced by not eating anything for hours, also if your last question was about why your _kin_ can't speak then I should inform you that those lesser beings are not your kin you have no kin, no peers, no equals, there is only you. That single thought of trying to help them of trying to make them _happy_ is why I had to discipline you."

The bound dragon's head was a whirl with competing thoughts and emotions about all that she now knew and didn't know. It was too much for her to take in right now so she suppressed it for now and made an eager noise at the figure to keep talking in the hopes that he would say something that she could use later on.

The teacher's mouth twitched for an instant before he resumed his lecture.

"I see that you are catching on quick enough and that you know that I am the only one who can help you. Now that you've come this far I can finally start to teach you the ins and outs of yourself and hopefully pull out those dormant traits in the process. I am going to release you now, but know that I am your teacher now and you will remain silent while I instruct you about how to use your abilities and you are only to talk when I ask you a question. Also be aware that I will not tolerate failure in any form, you are the ultimate dragon and as such you should be able to do all of this perfectly."

* * *

**AN:** Okay, long chapter with lots of details but the next one will be even more packed. Once again any questions can be asked via a review or private message.


	7. Chapter 7

**AN: **Chapter seven, now onto the information sections. Enjoy and review please.

* * *

With that he rubbed his farthest and middle digits together fast enough to produce a sound and the tendrils that held her captive dissolved like the mist they should have been formed from.

She slowly and stiffly got to her feet, aching from being restrained for so long and as she turned to face her new _teacher_ she shifted her expression to one of thankfulness and obedience.

He smiled as his new student adjusted herself to the role that had been planned out for her and began to lecture her once more.

"In this whole session I will teach you the five most important things that you need to know after which I will give you a test to see if you are ready to hazard the world alone." With that said he began to trace one of his digits in the air and wherever it moved a clear back streak followed and hung in the space. After a minute or so he had drawn what looked like the column that was the mists' second form with three large protrusions at the top.

"This," he said with slight contempt "is the pathway between the realms, the world tree, it is what you and the others used to get to this realm. It is not alive in the sense that you are, it does have a mind though and acts as a method to balance the power between the nine realms."

"Before you were alive you were nothing more than a small metal statue that was thrown onto the topmost pathway here,"

He pointed at the top branch on the right side of the tree.

"From here you were transported to the meeting point at the trunk where you were given life and powers. The magic used to create you was from one who can tweak the nature of everything and from one who wields the power of the sky, the world tree used these two magical qualities to shape each and every dragon into a unique creature with its own abilities but there are some common traits that most dragons share."

After his explanation was finished the tree dissolved and the mist began to churn and grow in size until it formed the shape that was familiar to the female dragon, for she had seen it before. It was the shape of the largest dragon, other than herself, that she had noticed. Just as she reached that conclusion her teacher began to talk again.

"Now that we have covered lesson one it is time to start lesson two, the various types of dragons and what they can do as well as the general basics of all dragons. First come the basics, most dragons have the ability to create fire and project it from their mouths. This ability is a much weaker form of the Creator's ability to change the nature of things and as such can only be used a certain number of times each day. In addition while it is being created this fire takes on the form of a thick green mist just like my current form and this mist is at once highly magical and highly flammable, do try not to be near a source of fire when creating it."

He paused for a moment, collecting his thoughts then continued.

"Second, thanks to the second source of magic in your creation, all dragons have some form of flight and the ability to fly through most any weather. Finally, as you may have noticed all dragons have the ability to communicate with their minds to a limited extent, some more than others, but none so much as you. This communication was just meant as a way for the dragons to grow and prosper mentally and to allow them a means of expressing themselves."

The dragon just nodded while inside she was beginning to put the pieces of the puzzle together as she started grasping more and more of what her teaching was saying. Far off in the distance she noticed several small shapes, they were too small to make out and she dare not break the "silence" rule so she just continued to listen as her teacher started speaking again.

"Now that we've covered the basics of dragons let's move on to the differences of each type of dragon."

It was during this lecture that the female learned about the abilities of all of her fellow dragons. She learned so much it was almost too much for her to take in. There were so many types, ones with buoyant spikes that could work as projectiles, ones with thick rock-like scales, and still others that could produce fire on their skin. The list seemed to go on and on but at least it stopped with a weird flat dragon that could produce a thunderous sound wave from its mouth.

_Dam, Loki did a really good job with this dragon, I'm impressed that she's been able to handle this much information so quickly._

Glancing around he too noticed the dark shapes and they were getting a bit clearer now.

_And from the looks of that she seems to be figuring things out, I'd better hurry up._

With that he launched into the most _delicate_ portion of the second lesson.

"The final part of this lesson is one which you can't be involved with but one that you need to know regardless. This part is about how dragons reproduce to create more dragons. Now before I go any farther you need to know that each subspecies of dragon has a male and female member that was how they were created."

"Two dragons are needed to reproduce and unfortunately for you there is no male counterpart for you to reproduce with. Why this is true is not important just take it as a fact of life. This would be a problem if you were any other type of dragon but luckily for you The Creator gave you what amounts to eternal life so you will not die from old age and so you don't need to worry about reproducing."

"Now that that is out of the way on to the main topic, firstly you need to know the lifespan of a healthy dragon is about 100 years and they become full grown at 10 years of age. At that age the males begin to produce their sperm and the females begin to become fertile. Now in terms of pregnancy all dragons lay eggs the number of eggs laid for each pregnancy varies based on the type of dragon, smaller dragons will lay less eggs and larger dragons will lay more eggs."

"Once impregnated the females will be very hostile and will require larger amounts of food than normal to sustain them and their clutch. The gestation periods for each dragon will again be based on size; larger dragons will take longer whereas smaller dragons will be able to give birth very quickly."

"The good news is that the females will only go into their mating season or heat, once every year and this first generation of dragons will wait for two years to allow for you to build a stable environment."

"Once they are laid the eggs will hatch in three to four weeks during that time the eggs will be self-sustaining and will need nothing other than a safe place to wait, they need no heat, no comfort and no attention. Also one last thing to note is that dragons mate for life and once they mark their mate nothing can stop them from being together. The act of marking their partner forges a unique bond between their two minds and links their lives and thoughts together in the most intimate way possible. If one of the pair happens to die then the other one must be killed for they will go insane from the loss. "Make sure that none of the others die until they lay at least five eggs, in addition to the ones provide by the world tree, or that species might cease to exist."

"With that the second lesson is complete; I'm going to wait for 25 minutes while you process what you have learned."

Having said that he closed his eyes and waited.

For her part, the mix of shock, mild revulsion, pity, and acceptance that had shaken her mind in the last lesson was a heavy burden for the female dragon to bear.

She got over it in 20 minutes and spent the remaining time looking around and just before her teacher started on lesson three, she noticed that the little black shapes had grown slightly larger and clearer but were still far too indistinct for her to make out.

* * *

**AN:** Well that's 2/5 lessons done I wonder what the other three could be like. Please leave any comments in the handy box at the bottom of this sentence.


	8. Chapter 8

**AN: **Chapter eight, lots of information in not very many words try not to get lost, my logic needs its own David Bowie song sometimes.

* * *

Before she could devote any more time to this; lesson three started and she locked her gaze back onto the speaker, wondering what else he could possibly have to tell her.

"This lesson will be focused on how to survive in this realm and what to do when you encounter problems. First and foremost are the three basic needs; water, food and shelter."

"Water is simple enough to get in this land all you have to do is melt the large snow deposits and drink quickly before it seeps into the ground. Also your scales act as small wind traps that will collect the moisture from the clouds and wind then your skin can absorb it directly. This system is not enough to keep you alive by itself but it does help with water demand. This is true of all dragons with the exceptions of a few but they have similar systems in place."

"You yourself will not need to worry about water due to being able to extract all the water you need from your food but the other dragons will need to consume a large amount of water every week, the amount will vary based on work done and type. With that let's move on to food."

"This is where you really need to pay attention if you don't want to die. I kind of lied earlier when I said that the pain you felt was hunger, it is in fact the one weakness that you have. Due to a series of complex processes involving your cells replicating at hyper speeds you have a higher energy demand and thus a fast metabolism."

"If you do not eat enough food every day then your older cells will destroy themselves to provide energy for the new ones to be created, thus causing the pain you felt. This is a problem because if you go too long without eating then you will be killed from the inside out by your own cells. The one upside of this cell division is that it will make repairing any injury a fast and simple task also you can't die from old age."

"As for how much you should eat, I don't know, you will have to figure that out through trial and error. As for a diet you can eat anything you want so long as it is organic, so no rocks and I would say no to plants as well. The others will be able to eat most types of meat just make sure that they avoid eating another dragon, dead or alive, and that they stay away from eels as those carry a toxic substance in their blood that will cause massive amounts of pain."

"With that lesson three is over now I shall begin lesson four. This is a lesson focused on the subject of you, your abilities, and your responsibilities."

"As you know you are special, even for a dragon, you have extreme long life, you have an omnivore diet, and you have a more advanced mind then the others."

"These things you know, but what you don't know is far more impressive. Your special powers go far beyond the normal dragon; they were designed to make you to be the leader, a queen, and the most powerful."

"You have three unique abilities that will allow you to rise to the top. Firstly is your body, lacking a limit on fire production and your enormous size will make challenging you impossible."

"Second is your mind, its ability to think, reason, analyze and absorb information will allow you to outthink even the smartest of opponents."

"Lastly your mental abilities will allow you to override the willpower of the weaker dragons to form a type of hive mind with the others acting as mere pawns to do your bidding. This army is why you have this mind space; it is designed to be the center from which you can issue orders to all the dragons that you are mentally controlling."

As he spoke the black shapes that had been growing larger and more defined finally appeared behind his student, he smiled brightly and motioned to them,

"And it looks like the time for a small test has just arrived; meet the troops 'Queen'."

She jumped a little, and then whipped around to see what her teacher was talking about, a test, a test to determine if she could indeed form the army from the various dragons around her. At first she was excited about being able to do what her teacher wanted but as she looked at the dragons a realization dawned upon her. These were the dragons that she was trying to reach out to just before she was brought to this place, these were her kin, it didn't matter what her teacher told her; she couldn't bring herself to force the others into servitude.

Just as she reached this conclusion she felt a sharp rap on her head and once again made a painful contact with the floor. She groaned and turned to see her teacher standing above her with his fist balled and ready to strike her again. She flinched as he lowered his arm and whispered.

"Now you listen and listen well, I didn't go through all that effort to have you back out now. You are going to do this or I am going to make you suffer more then you thought possible, for in this space I can mutilate your form over and over but nothing will happen to your actual body. Now stand up, you need some truth in your head."

As she struggled to her paws the teacher walked a few paces away and waved his hand through the air. Moments later the mist that comprised his right arm broke away and began to assume a new shape. It flattened out into a rectangle and then the mist turned from green vapor into a sheet of polished substance that reflected the image of the being that looked into it. She blinked and hanging before her was a mirror, this mirror showed her, but at the same time she could tell that it wasn't her, the look in her reflection's eyes was not right it looked cold and mean.

It was then that the one armed teacher spoke,

"This is a mirror that reveals the true nature of the things that it reflects. That is you my dear, you as you really are. At your core beneath all the surface happy nice bullshit you are dark and manipulative; you have a primal desire to control, to be the master. The you in the mirror knows it, now you too must accept that you are a primary predator, the highest member of the pecking order. Now prove that you were not just a colossal waste of effort and that you have a purpose in this land, show me the value of yourself and create the army you were designed to lead!"

He finished with a bellow that caused what little composure the poor dragon had left to snap, she didn't break down, in fact she wasn't even sad; she was pissed and she was going to do something about it.

She was mere moments away from lunging at her teacher and tearing him to little pieces when she stopped. How had she become this angry over a reflection in a mirror? Was it true? Could it be true that all it took to set her off was a few minor taunts and a punch, why did she have these overpowering desires to inflict suffering on the one who had been showing her how to live, helping her.

She stood perfectly still seething with her own emotions until the forms of the other dragons closed in around her and began to sooth her. The largest actually pushed out its snout to try and sniff her!

That was the breaking point; she had reconciled the fact that she was a tyrant, that all of her surface guff was just a show to get the others to accept her, but why would she need that now that she knew the truth; the truth that they could be subjugated with a flick of her keen mind.

She proceeded to do just that starting with the largest she entered his mind and beat down his petty subconscious until it was the equivalent of a bloody pulp, barely enough free will left to breathe and certainly not enough to move. One by one she proceeded to do the same with all the dragons present. With each new follower she gained she also felt some of the emptiness inside her vanish as if the slaves were filling a small hole in her that she didn't even know was there.

Unnoticed by the dragon, for each follower she gained the mirror reflected that dragon's image only that each of them bore an expression of enormous pain upon their faces and the reflection of the queen had the approximation of a smile on her reptilian face.

Once all the assembled dragons were under her control the teacher turned the mirror back into his arm, clapped his hands together and announced,

"Well done 'Queen' color me impressed. I declare lesson four passed and now we shall start lesson five. This lesson will focus on the greater purpose of why the dragons are here and who you will be fighting with this new army. It is time you learn about the world of the humans, the world of your future prey."


	9. Chapter 9

**AN: **I hope that you all enjoyed the last chapter, this one is going to be very short, only 500-ish words long. Chapter nine, lesson five. Enjoy!

* * *

He then proceeded to modify the rest of his body, bringing out a nose, ears, and other bits thus completing his resemblance to a male human. He then turned extra mist into all the various comforts that the humans had created as well as scale models of their ships, buildings and known weapons. Thus prepared he began his final lesson, the lesson of how to destroy all the humans.

"The most important thing for any predator to know is its prey and therefore the first thing I will teach you is the structure of the human body followed by vital information about the world that they have built for themselves."

"All humans have weak points at their necks, thighs, middle sections, wrists, and shoulders. In general any type of blow to the head will kill or severely injure them. In the case of the males the hollow of their legs is a great spot to hit if you are in a pinch."

"Now as helpless as this species seems you must be aware that, while their bodies are frail when compared to yours, the human mind is perhaps the most dangerous weapon ever created. The humans have managed to fuse rocks together into a new substance called metal. This is then sharpened and when used correctly, can cut right through most any dragon. You must be wary of their cunning nature and their ability to adapt to change."

"The human buildings are simple to overcome, just light them ablaze or crush them but be careful that your troops are not surrounded or they will be overpowered by sheer numbers. The one thing that the humans have going for them is numbers, they reproduce with the speed of vermin."

"If the humans are putting up a tough fight then you can simply raid their food sources and starve them to death, a normal human can only go 20 or so days without food before they die."

He paused for a minute to ensure that the female dragon had understood all that he had thus far said before he continued.

"The main problem with taking out all the humans is their location; they have spread far and wide across the world. Not all of them are the same but they must all be killed, and you must be the commander of the army that does it, for no other predators exist for these vermin."

"You should be aware that just knowing this information is not enough. The humans have an unparalleled will to survive and can adapt to new information to better their chances of beating you. Your attacks, once started must be swift to cover the land or they must be carried out in locations that are so remote as to prevent the spread of your existence to the rest of the human population. Any information that becomes widely known about dragons will just help them survive even longer and they may even come up with ways to defeat your assaults. "


	10. Chapter 10

**AN: **With this the story is caught up to where I've written it so far. If you haven't reviewed it yet please consider doing so as feedback is not only fun to read but can provide much needed motivation with the future updates.

* * *

As he finished what was, hopefully, his final lecture, the Queen noticed something strange about the figure. It might've just been her getting used to his appearance but, he did look much less dense than before. In fact, even as she watched his form began to waver and shift, becoming thinner and thinner by the instant.

As she looked on she noticed a feeling or more accurately, a loss of feeling. It wasn't a numbness it was more of an emptiness inside her that felt as though someone was slowly pulling her heart out through her throat. She was afraid now, as there seemed to be a direct correlation between the physical state of her teacher and the amount of emptiness that she felt. As more and more of his substance vanished so too did the void inside her grow in volume.

In her panic her eyes began to dart from one portion of her teacher's form to another looking for any further signs of dispersion. He met her straying gaze then and smiled at her.

Just as she was about to ask for an explanation, he began to talk once again.

"It seems that you have finally noticed the effects of my presence here and I am truly sorry for this but I can at least give you an explanation before my energies are gone."

"Will you accept this final gift my dear?"

The queen was confused at his radical change in manners but nodded her acceptance never the less. Once she gave the nod her teacher approached her and reached out a hand.

She flinched thinking that he was going to strike her again, but was taken aback when his touch was gentile as he rested his hand on her jawbone. He began to speak in a soft apologetic voice that made her ears prick up.

"Firstly let me start off by saying that none of what I am about to say is an ideal reality but it is reality all the same."

"Earlier when we first met I told you a bit about myself but that was not all that makes up what I am. I told you before that I was the will of The Creator and while that is the truth it is not the whole truth. I am a being that was given form by combining the knowledge and magic of The Creator with the life granting power of the world tree."

"I know just as much as The Creator did at the moment that I was created and by using his magic I am able to glean insights about any subject in Midgard, thus I was the perfect instrument to instruct you in any subject."

"Those are my good qualities but, as you will come to understand, every story has two sides."

"The second side of my story is the reason for what you are currently experiencing. You see I lack a body of my own and as such I needed energy to form myself and communicate with you."

"The unfortunate part is that the energy to sustain my current form was and is still provided by your positive emotions. By using some of the little power I had to start with I was able to shift your emotions of joy, happiness, and contentment into a form of matter that I then used to build myself a semi-physical form; albeit only in this mind space."

Here he paused to gesture at his current form that now resembled his original blob form more than his human one. He then continued at a faster pace.

"I know that most of this will be hard to accept right now but even you can't change fact and the fact is that I have used you to sustain myself and my energy, your positive emotion, is nearly spent. Even now that void inside of you is growing ever larger and by the time that I am gone you will have lost all of the positive emotions that the intelligent species enjoy. Just know that your sacrifice will not be in vain so long as you can fulfill your purpose here."

_Yes, I must fulfill my purpose! I have nothing else to live for and maybe if I kill all of those humans then I can find a way to restore my lost emotions._

While she was thinking over what she had learned the void inside her grew deeper and deeper.

The form of the teacher was now much smaller and shrinking by the second. When he resumed talking his voice was high and filled with something akin to remorse.

"My demise is imminent and so I will give you one last piece of advice."

"Though we have been here for hours and hours the amount of time that has passed in the real world is considerably smaller, at a guess I would say that only a few hours have slipped by. Inside this special place, your mind, communications happen extremely quickly and thus the amount of information that can be processed is greatly increased when compared to real world time."

"Use this space wisely for though it can reduce the amount of time that you have to spend planning, it consumes a large amount of mental energy to do so. Lastly I wish to ensure that we part ways as friends, I know that we had our ups and downs but now that I am on my metaphorical deathbed I want to be sure that all is forgiven."

At this statement the queen looked down at the now tiny globule of green mist and remained silent so long that the little thing spoke again with a pleading tone in its voice.

"Well your highness, can we part as friends rather than enemies?"

Her response was swift and brooked no argument, she smiled down at the powerless mass and replied,

"Of course we can, thanks for teaching me all that I needed to know."

Just as the little green blob gave a happy exclamation it was incinerated by a large blast of fire from the Queen.

As she clamped her jaws together she sneered and muttered quietly to herself,

"All is forgiven, _teacher_"

Due to the immense development of the void inside of her it was a simple matter to kill her teacher. He was weak and, by his own admission, had served his purpose. What she failed to connect was that in killing her teacher instead of letting him die naturally, she had effectively killed off her own positive emotions forever.

As this revelation was lost on her she decided to heed the last piece of advice given to her and so she began to focus on withdrawing herself from that white space and back to reality.

Her eyes slowly opened and gazed around her, everything was the same as she remembered it before going into her mind except that the light was at a different position now indicating the passage of much time and the ache that she now knew to be caused by her own body was getting worse.

Just as she came to the decision to go and look for food, four dragons that she recalled from her mind room rose and made their way to the edge of the ice sheet. She tried reaching out to them by means of verbal communication but it had no effect. A mental probe was the next attempt at communication and that reached them, all she could tell was that they had one overriding impulse, the command to hunt.

_Well it looks like they are going to be the hunters from now on, I just hope they bring me enough food I'm very hungry._

As she thought this the self elected dragons dived into the freezing water.

It was at the point that the group made contact with the arctic waters that it happened. The queen was once again yanked from the world and into her mind area, only this time it was different. Where before the space had been a solid white everywhere now it was as though a window had appeared on the floor and she was looking at the group of dragons from above.

There were slight problems with the viewpoints, it was as though the whole world was black and each dragon shone out a cone of light from its eyes that pierced the darkness and allowed for sight. The left, right and rear of each dragon was black unless another dragon was swimming close enough behind to illuminate it.

The more she studied the group the more she was angry with how they were arranged; it was so inefficient to the point of being painful.

Finally she couldn't take it anymore and began to issue orders in her head, knowing that they would be followed.

_Okay, this isn't going to get me anywhere. You lot pay attention! The one with the flat blue body take point, the long one with the overly large head curl up behind the leader and get ready to strike. Next you with the two heads start sweeping left and right. Go over the middle one. Lastly, you with the spikes and center blind spot look up and down but stay above the leader._

The last light blue dragon shifted into place just as she finished issuing her orders. Now the hunting party was formed, they needed to find their prey.

_You in the lead start trying to locate the vibrations of the living beings in the water. Look for either a large amount of small vibrations or a small group of large vibrations. When you've located them charge into the cluster. _

_If it is the small cluster then the one curled up behind the leader will lunge forward and catch as many of the small things as possible in the pouch below his mouth._

_If it is the larger group the leader will release a wave of sound to confuse them and while the beasts are trying to recover you on top will riddle them full of spikes in conjunction with the one who can shoot hot water, this will ensure that the wounds are sealed before too much of that nutritious blood can be lost._

_When you are finished with the hunt return to the ice sheet and distribute the catch as evenly as possible after I take my half of it._

Just as with the positioning problem, as soon as she thought of it, her commands were obeyed with exact precision. In no more than 15 minutes the hunting party had collected a couple dozen of the smaller fish, set half next to the queen and spread the rest out among the various dragons.

As soon as she was sure that the small group didn't need her full attention anymore, she left her mind room and began to devour the medium sized pile of fish in front of her. After her meal, which hadn't really filled her as much as it should have, she began to flit around through the minds of those dragons that she had no control over yet. Her findings were interesting, all of the dragons that were awake had been very _something_ to find an amount of food laid out for them while those that were sleeping were having the strangest dreams.

Their dreams seemed to be made of pure light, not unlike the sun in the sky, but this light was different, more self centered and a little brighter. After four or five such dreams the queen began to hate the sight of that light in her mind's eye and so set about bringing each of those lights under her control and pushing them into the tiny corner of each dragon's mind that was still theirs to keep.

* * *

**AN: **A bit of an odd ending point but hey, I just wanted to get this posted. As this story will now be updated as it is being written I can not promise an exact date for new chapters. I can say that the longest I will go without updating either the story or my profile is about a week. If you ever start to wonder if I'm still writing just wait for the next weekend and if nothing has been posted, check my profile for news or just send me a private message.


	11. Chapter 11

**AN: **So here is chapter 11 and things are picking up their pace. I will be implementing a time skip shortly that will skip about 300 Midgard years and also a few other things.

* * *

Once her work was done the queen began a bit of self assessment.

"_Well it seems as though I have eaten enough to sustain myself for now. The only question is will that small morsel be enough to keep me alive until tomorrow? I doubt it very much I should send out the hunting squad again to make sure that I have enough food stockpiled."_

Having decided on that course of action she proceeded to do just that except that this time she used the female versions of the dragons as she didn't want to tire the males out too much today. To her astonishment the female proved to be terrible at hunting, oh they caught food alright, but it was small when compared with what the males had brought in.

"_It seems as though while they are much fiercer right now; the females are just not cut out for water hunting."_

Having learned what she deemed an important lesson the queen was just about to curl up to go to sleep when a nagging thought struck her. She had no name, no proper designation. She was the Queen yes but beyond that she had nothing to call herself, this seemed like a major problem to her and one she decided to fix.

"_My army needs to have a name to learn to respect, a name that no one will soon forget. Let's see, what is the best name for a queen of my stature?"_

After several minutes of thinking and going through her extensive knowledge of the languages that she was aware of, she finally selected a fitting name.

"_That's it! I shall be known as the root of queen, my name shall be Regina, for that is queen and I am THE queen"_

Having reached her choice Regina decided that now was as good a time as any to rest, it had been a long day filled with too much shit. As she drifted off to sleep so too did the other 156 dragons lay down to rest with her.

She had the most horrible dreams that night, they were of herself, she was bound down, she could sense the passage of time and as the time passed so too did the pain begin to return to her body. After so much time had passed the pain had gotten to the point of insanity. Just as she was about to pass out, her body erupted into flames and before long all that was left was ashes on the ground.

She woke with a start and stared around at her surroundings for a second before her eyes fell on the meager pile of food, without further thought she devoured them all, not even bothering to chew just trying to get the food into her body as fast as possible.

"_That was a very unsettling experience I must send out both hunting parties to try and stockpile as much food as possible, and perhaps I shall also send out a few scouts to look for larger land based food to the south. Whatever I do it must be done quickly; I don't want to test my body's endurance to hunger."_

With her new plan of action she did just that, both the male and female hunting groups went out and in due course returned. They were then sent out again and twice more after that.

"_I need to be smarter about how I distribute the food this time. Let's see, the hunting party will need a larger share due to all the work that they've done today. The smaller dragons will get the smallest meals, as will the ones whose purpose hasn't yet been assigned."_

It was at this point that Regina noticed that the hunting party was thirsty and so, cursing quietly at the weak creatures, she assigned the two dragons that could coat themselves in fire to roll around in the snow banks to melt them into drinkable water for the whole lot of reptiles.

The last thing on her agenda today was to send out a few of the faster dragons to scout the land. These dragons had to be very quick but also able to survive on their own without direct control from her mind space.

"_Hmm, well the ideal ones to do this would be the ones from the hunting party with the spikes but I suppose that would be unreasonable to expect so much out of the two. I guess I'll have to sacrifice speed for stealth then. The two small green ones would make great land based scouts but their flight speed was too slow and they were too vulnerable if found." _

Regina thought for a few more minutes before she recalled a dragon that could blend into its surroundings with ease.

"_I've got it; I'll have the ones that have camouflage carry the little dragons around from place to place and once they land in a new area the small guys will scout around. I just need a contingency plan if they're spotted by a human. I don't much like the idea of a charred human corpse being left as evidence so I guess I'll send the small one that has the extreme poison as a last resort to kill any humans without making more than a small bite mark."_

Having decided on what dragons to send scouting she arranged for them to be fed and watered before they winged their way to the south with the instructions to,

"_Look into the lands to the south and don't be seen if at all possible. You are looking for an isolated area with a stable water source and plenty of nearby food. If you are seen by a creature that walks on two legs, kill it fast with your poison. You are to return here within seven days with good news, if you don't have good news don't bother returning because it will be incredibly painful for you."_

Having received Regina's orders the scouting group took off with a flurry of wings and displaced air.

With the scouting group underway Regina decided to start making plans on how to deal with any information that they might bring back. While doing so she was extremely confident that they would find some place with the right conditions to call home. Once she knew the exact location the whole group of dragons would migrate to their new homeland. The transport of the dragons and their eggs would be quite the chore but it was better to do it before the eggs hatched.

For the dragons most would be able to transport both themselves and their eggs with a little careful instruction but there were a few dragons that were so small that they couldn't carry more than one egg each.

If it came to it she would take the excess burden of the transport herself though she didn't yet know if doing physical labor would cause a stress on her body that would have to be reduced with extra amounts of food. In the worst case scenario she would not be able to make the trip on her own and one or two of the stronger dragons would have to carry her to the new land.

Once on the land the first priority for her was to locate and retrieve a large amount of food, after that the secondary task would be to assign sentries to watch the boarders for any signs of human activity. Once that was done she could finally start to build something better than a home, she would create an army of deadly creatures to ravage the lives of thousands of those pesky humans.

Oh sure, it might takes decades of work and sweat to accomplish but time was one resource that Regina had in spades. It was all going to be perfect! She had all the right moves planned out for her conquest, the humans were clueless as ever; she had over 100 combat ready troops with five others of subspecies due to hatch in less than a month. She had the element of surprise, the advantage of information and if things came down to it she could enter the fray herself to decimate an entire population of humans from any given area.

Regina loosed a sigh of egotistical narcissism as she imagined all of those weak humans dying by fire and talon in the near future because of her efforts. Yes she was ready to leave this barren place and begin the process of purging the human vermin from these lands.

* * *

**AN: **So this is the time skip part. So here are the basics, the scouts report back with good news of a small island that is perfect for the needs of the dragon population.

the dragons migrate smoothly to this new island and begin to set up a civilization with no problems from the humans. after a few years the dragons have a stable force of fighters with enough extra to replace any that are lost.

At this point Regina starts to send out strike forces to destroy the various human settlements within a 100 mile radius of the island. After a few years all the humans have been cleansed from that area of the world.

The process now repeats itself a few dozen times but the dragons travel south and west across the map wiping out all the human that they can find.

in the middle of this the Vikings show up and begin exploring the world, covering over the previously purged islands. When Regina finally discovers this she is enraged she returns with a small force and a few dozen eggs to a previously destroyed island to wipe out these _Vikings. _This island is the nest referred to in the movie and it was picked because to the west of it are still a few islands with enough food and water to sustain the dragons. The Vikings don't put up much of a fight _until _the dragon invasion reaches the island of berk and here the bastards are holding out quite well, 300 years well in fact.

The rest of the world continues to be purged by the sizable dragon forces which suffers minimal losses on their mission. For all intents and purposes Berk and any islands to the east of it are the only safe havens left in Midgard.

* * *

**AN 2: **Sorry for having to put that there but in all honesty I didn't want to write about all the carnage and death that happened in the 300 years between the creation of dragons and the start of the movie plot any more than you wanted to read another five chapters about it. To me it just gets boring after a while of writing about the same process over and over again but what can you do. If enough people really want that part of the story included I will write another story after this one, dedicated solely to how Regina built her dragon empire and what they did during that time.

Next chapter will be up by March 24th at the latest, finally getting to the creation of Toothless with a few modifications from yours truly. Please enjoy, review if you want and any questions or requests for the details of the 300 year time skip can be submitted via a private message or review.


	12. Chapter 12

**AN: **sorry just couldn't stand not uploading this now. Please enjoy the creation of everyone's favorite black scaled protagonist, Toothless!

* * *

**In the upper branch of the World Tree **

**Two** **days** **earlier**

The hammer of Thor had just entered the portal to Midgard. Upon entering the branch the odd bundle of Mjolnir, Loki's notes and the metal figure were split apart. They were not flung straight to their destined realm though, instead they locked in place while the information that each contained was analyzed by the tree.

The notes were the first object to bear the gaze of the World Tree, Ygdrasil. The paper of the notes began to shift and as time passed the individual sheets were fused together and then morphed into a ball of light that proceeded on its way to Midgard at a fast clip.

The second object to be examined was the small metal figure of the male dragon. After a few minutes the little chunk of metal was also allowed to continue down the pathway, though it traveled at a vastly slower pace then had the notes.

Finally the hammer was to be inspected; it was the only source of a higher realm's power among the three objects and so had been saved for last. As Ygdrasil looked upon the hammer it noticed something, not about the weapon itself, but rather an intense emotional aura that hung about it. Ygdrasil had sensed a similar but weaker aura of emotion connected to the small metal creature but had thought nothing of it at the time. Now however, things were different. If that small figure had the same traces of such sorrowful and yet hopeful emotions it must be retested.

With that conclusion the metal figure, which had been but a few seconds away from passing through the barrier of light, was yanked back to float next to the hammer. Now that the two were together Ygdrasil began and in-depth investigation on the story of these two connected objects.

The torrent of information that Ygdrasil found would've certainly overwhelmed a lesser being but it took the information in as easy as a normal tree absorbs sunlight. What Ygdrasil witnessed during this time was very bad; it was something catastrophic that would, given time destroy one of the nine realms. Something had to be done and so Ygdrasil made some quick, calculated, logical choices.

First off the humans needed to be warned about the dragons but the notes on all the species were too far gone down the path to be called back and formed into a compendium that would stand the test of time. The one thing that Ygdrasil did manage to do was to aim the ball of information at a pregnant human woman, now one of her descendents would be the one to write the compendium of the dragons and hopefully that should be enough to get the word out to many of the people.

Second was the matter of this dragon and its role in this entire muddle. It was now clear to Ygdrasil that the dragons were a danger to Midgard and that they needed to be stopped, based on that the logical thing to do would be to destroy this dragon. The only thing that prevented this was the connection between the metal figure and the hammer, for the emotions that bound them together were ones of protection and a desire to right the wrongs of the world. This odd link of emotions was the reason why Ygdrasil decided to allow the metal dragon to have a chance on Midgard.

The only problem was that alone this poor creature would be almost powerless to stop the carnage from occurring, thus Ygdrasil made a fateful choice. The prized weapon of Thor was struck with a concentrated blast of power and split into two halves while the handle was kept intact.

To save the realm of Midgard was going to require more than just one dragon, it was going to take a miracle and that was just what Ygdrasil was going to provide.

The first half of the broken weapon shot down the pathway so fast that it released explosions of sound as it traveled. Its speed was so fast that the metal started to flake off into the abyss. By the time it reached the end of the pathway it was nothing more than a small sliver of what it once was. As it passed fully into the realm it changed from the solid metal into a clump of lightning and from there it stretched until it resembled a lance, but it was incomplete, resembling only the front end of a bolt of lightning that one might see in a storm.

With an almighty report it made its presence known in the realm. It struck the horned helmet of a woman who was with child but didn't know it yet and there it waited for many years, it was a powerful force but without its other half it could do nothing.

As soon as the first half of the weapon was on its way Ygdrasil began to quickly strip down the second half of the hammer to extract its half of the lightning bolt. Once it was extracted it too resembled a lightning bolt except it was the opposite of the other. This bolt was not destined for Midgard though; this one was placed right into the head of the metal dragon.

With that final alteration the metal being began its way rapidly down the path to Midgard.

Now the only thing that Ygdrasil had left to do was to punish the one who created this whole situation, the denizen of Asgard known as Loki and to task the one who had supplied the materials and had the desire to correct his mistake; Thor.

The handle of the now used weapon split into two pieces, the first became charged with enough dark energy to make its way back through the gate and enter the realm of Asgard. It quickly made its way to the, still healing, Loki and melded with the skin of his right forearm. After a bit of time a symbol formed there, it was a goblet made of black lines with a single teardrop shaped mass of red hanging above it.

The second piece shone with a golden light and it transported itself into the cell where Thor was being held, there it floated down over the sleeping immortal and branded upon his left forearm the symbol of an eye made from lines of gold inside of a blue triangle.

With its role in events completed Ygdrasil's consciousness retreated back into the abyss and waited for events to run their course.

**Near the barrier of light inside Ygdrasil**

The metal statue was nearing the barrier now and just as with the others of its kind the first thing to change was for the metal bits to evaporate and leave a glowing outline of the dragon behind. This was where the differences started, after the metal had been removed all that should've dilled the red outline was nothing but with this dragon the lightning bolt form before was present as well. It was stuck hovering inside the dragon's body and once the metal was gone the lightning began to spread all throughout the body.

The lightning got to the point where it finally touched the red outlines and there it swarmed like a colony of ants it marched down the red lines and in its wake it left them a stunning electric blue. Once all the red was filled in the process of life continued as normal with the bones, organs and the muscles but once the mind of the dragon started to develop, the lightning began to surge and flow once again.

It seemed to like sparking around the dragon's head quite a bit. As it arced from point to point over the outline of the dragon, a few bolts would occasionally strike the brain of the dragon and be absorbed into it.

The penultimate step was the scales and here again the lightning interfered with the process. It flashed out and created a cloud of vapor that was so black that it actually made everything around it seems infinitely brighter by comparison. Within the cloud small arcs of lightning jumped from point to point for a few minutes then the cloud dispersed to reveal a completed skin made of scales as black as the cloud with all the power and wild energy of the lightning, except that its awesome force seemed to have been frozen and melded with scales for they thrummed with a slight power all their own.

The final act of creation was the external features of the eyes the lightning had run itself out with the previous changes and so the dragon's eye were formed from the small amount of magic that had been contained in the blood of Loki that covered Thor's hammer. His eyes were a pale green that shone in the dim passageway. His eyes were strange though for he had two different pupil shapes, the first was the typical dragon shape of vertical slits but the other was the round shape of a mammal.

With that his transformation from a metal plaything into a powerful savior was complete and he was sent rocketing out just like his fellows, onto the ice sheet in the far north.

* * *

**AN: **Sorry that the chapter was short but everyone knows what he looks like already so it would've been a waste to describe him in great detail. The next chapter will be out shortly and will contain a few relevant twists to the plot as well as a description of Toothless' abilities and such from an all too familiar source. After that I don't know all the details yet but I'll get to that bridge in due course.

One last thing PLEASE review! I know people don't like to write down their thoughts or maybe this story is just kinda bland for most readers but any feedback, regardless of its contents, is still feedback.


	13. Chapter 13

**AN:** Well here is chapter 13, sorry that this took so long to put out but I had some issues with my hardware not working and then thrown out of a conveniently placed window, into the snow. Anyway here is the next chapter, finally moving into a bit of action. A fair warning here, the whole exposition about how the rest of the story will play out was taken from a few separate sources some of which I can't name, they might just be the figments of my brain mixing with a lot of Doctor Who.

As I have said in most of my other author notes, please send me a PM or a review if there is something that you need clarification with as this is one twisted chapter. With that please enjoy chapter 13!

* * *

**Thor's prison cell in Asgard**

Thor's eyes jolted open, he had been sleeping but he had the most terrible dream that Loki had been standing over him with a smile on his face! Slowly Thor looked around his cell until his eyes fell on the door that was always kept closed, it was open. Inside the doorway was the figure from his dream, Loki was standing right where he had dreamed he was but this Loki had a very different expression than his dream version.

Loki stood there leaning on the doorframe with his back bowed and face racked with such sorrow that it almost made Thor want to comfort him. Almost wasn't enough though, Thor jumped up and accosted the disheveled god.

"Loki, why are you here? How can you be here? I thought that I had killed you ages ago. If you are alive then that means that I am not guilty of murder and my sentence for helping you was much shorter than the life sentence I was given. You must tell me what happened to you, and also why you are in such a state I've never seen you like this before I've never se-"

Thor stopped as Loki let out a cry of what sounded like pain and began to shake violently clutching at his right forearm. After a few seconds the spasms stopped and with a tired sigh Loki showed Thor his forearm.

It was all the answer that he needed Thor knew immediately what the mark meant; it was a curse from the World Tree, one of the worst possible curses to bear.

This was the curse of shared pain; it caused those with the mark to suffer the pain of those whom they had wronged and in Loki's case that pain was undoubtedly coming from all the suffering humans in Midgard.

It was at this point that Loki finally spoke; his voice had changed drastically for it now sounded full of remorse and showed the long pain he had suffered due to the curse. It was slow and halting like the voice of someone who has lived a long a weary life.

"Well Thor I guess … things worked out in the end. My _perfect_ dragons did their work and did it well, very, very well. I see now that making them … was the worst mistake I have ever made. While I have received no punishment from the elders of Asgard … I would gladly endure any trial if only to remove this curse. That is the reason for my visit today; for I received a message from the World Tree … saying that you created a final dragon … and that you had the intent to fix the situation in Midgard."

Thor was a bit taken aback at the halting pauses in Loki's voice and at the bare facts of the situation as he knew them now.

"While it is true that I created a final dragon and sent him through the portal to Midgard, that was 300 years ago and I doubt he had much success in his efforts to stop the flood of other dragons."

Loki's expression did not change as he spoke once again,

"Thor, you should take a look at your left forearm … it appears as though your task is yet unfinished."

With a quizzical expression Thor glanced down at his arm and immediately saw what Loki was talking about, for branded on his flesh was a symbol that he didn't recognize, it was a golden triangle surrounding a light blue eye.

"What does this mark mean Loki?"

For a brief instant Loki smiled, a genuine grin, breaking his pained mask for the first time in almost 300 years. With a glint of hope in his eye and a joyous tremor in his speech he said:

"Thor that is the blessing of divine intervention! It is the single most powerful type of magic in all the nine realms, with it I believe that you can restore peace and order to Midgard."

"The triangle is the symbol of structure and support; it will allow you alter the events of Midgard without the expenditure of extra power. With it you can change the physical world to a certain degree though its power is limited by the laws of reality and it cannot be used to inflict harm upon a living creature."

"The eye is the symbol of wisdom and clarity, it is perhaps the more useful of the two in this situation, as it can be used to project known information to anything that needs it and it functions like a window, allowing you to see the events that are transpiring on Midgard. It too has its limits though and cannot be used to see the intentions of mortals and it cannot interfere with free will. It is purely information, how that knowledge is used is up to the individual."

As Thor looked at the mark with new understanding it began to glow and, while he made no choice, Thor's arm moved so that the glow was shining on the wall. As the two watched on in silence the glow became stronger and turned into a square of blue light projected on the wall. Words followed, flickering slightly but not enough so as to unreadable. After a few moments of writing, there was a message displayed on the wall and its contents was very relevant to the two immortals; for it described the task set to Thor by the World Tree, Thor began to read it in silence:

_The realm of Midgard has fallen into chaos while you were preoccupied with your own problems, now you must work in conjunction with your dragon to try and save the realm. _

_Thor, though Loki knows this to some degree, the passage of time is not synchronous between the realms of Midgard and Asgard. Though it has been but a short time since you created your dragon savior, 300 years have passed on Midgard and the realm is now a desolate place filled with the sorrow and pain of the humans._

_There is hope however for, as the scale that keeps the order of the realms, one of my abilities is to designate not only the location of those that use my pathways; but the time that they arrive. I have just placed your dragon into the realm ten years after the original dragons and in roughly the same location. Unfortunately, 10 years is as close as I could get him, due to the severe imbalance of the realm and I do not know the exact location of the other dragons on Midgard at that point in time either. _

_My direct help ends here, as I am forbidden to alter the internal workings of the realms so long as they remain peaceful and at the time that your dragon is at, the first generation of dragons haven't caused enough destruction to warrant that level of interference. _

_Even though I can't influence the realm directly I can allow you to do so, thus the blessing of divine intervention, it will allow you to create a manifestation of your will upon Midgard and allow you to directly change the course that events will take. This is a very specialized case Thor, and I expect that you will not abuse this power._

_The tool that you will be using is your dragon, I have taken special care with his creation and he is a marvel of a creature. The finer details of his abilities are something that you and he will have to discover together though, as even I can't predict what specific effects your power had on him. I will also leave the details of his purpose on Midgard to you as you were the one who designed him._

_One detail that you should be aware of about his creation was that I split your hammer into two pieces. I embedded one inside of the dragon and the other I sent flying down to rest inside the body of a developing child, what will become of the child you know better than I. I simply felt that in order to stop the current chaos, your dragon might need a bit of normal help from something on Midgard in addition to the help he will be receiving from you; and who better to help him save the humans than a human._

_The fate of this human is out of your hands though, as nothing, not even a god can interfere with the mortal's nature._

_Next is the matter of Loki, if he has not gone insane from the curse yet, he should be very willing to help you, for the only way for the curse to be broken is for the present situation to be fixed. If he agrees to help you, then you will have valuable information about the group of dragons and will, with luck, be able to stop them from carrying out their mission to destroy all the humans on Midgard._

_Lastly you must be aware of the context of your task, for to meddle with the flow of time is a dangerous prospect. As it sits now, the situation on Midgard is critical. In just 300 years the army of dragons has been able to wipe out nearly 90% of all human life, and they are working hard to finish the job. The only specs of life left are some very tough humans that started to explore the seas near when the dragons started their attacks. These humans have traveled across a majority of the north and eastern seas but are being halted by waves of dragon invasions. The forward most group resides on an island that is small and rocky, surrounded by a few protrusions of land here and there. The people that live there have been fighting the dragons in one form or another for nigh on 300 years, with their ancestors being one of the first to be attacked by the horde or dragons. It is on this island that the human whom was to be partnered with your dragon, lived._

_Now as for your actions, while they will be conducted in the future, after this message has been read this patch of light will become a portal of its own. All of your choices either in Asgard or as your projected will in Midgard shall be transported back in time, using your dragon as a beacon for them. You will not be able to see the repercussions of your choices, until the time when your dragon reaches this point in the timeline, 290 years later._

_In a perfect universe your dragon, with some help, will be able to save Midgard in less than 290 years and the current present of Midgard will never have happened. The fate of a realm is now in your hands Thor, be careful with it, for if the current events become the set events than there is little that you will be able to do. Now go, and undertake this mission with your full determination and my blessing. When things do reach the current time in Midgard my mark upon your forearm will vanish and the fate of the humans will be in their own hands. _

Once Thor had finished reading the message it started to shift, it became denser, more present and darker. Soon it was as though he was looking through a window at the blackest night that he could ever remember, and then some. Starting from the edges the blackness slowly began to fade to white and before he knew it Thor beheld a being that seemed to have been formed from the darkness. It was lying on what he guessed to be a field of snow; it was at this point that he noticed that the thing was making the telltale motions of sleep.

As he looked at the sleeping dragon, he marveled that the small figure had turned into the beast before him. From what parts he could see it was exactly like the model, though he didn't expect its hide to be so black, it would stand out in all but the dark of night or the clouds of an oncoming storm. It was during this observation that he felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see what was happening.

Loki, who had been able to read the message much faster than Thor, was having a silent emotional and mental debate with himself. One the one hand he was very happy that there was a way to remove his curse but on the other he despised the fact that it had to be by assisting Thor in his _heroic_ efforts to save the humans.

This conversation raged on for several minutes while Thor was _still_ reading the message, just when it seemed like neither side would yield the curse dealt him yet another blow of suffering and pain. This one was from a child who had just lost his parents to the small jaws of the rodent-like dragons. As Loki was forced to endure the mental pain of the child so too was he made to bear the physical pain of the adults as they were eaten alive by the pack. Tiny burning needles poked his flesh and tore away at his muscle. Luckily a well aimed bite to the neck was enough to stop the trio's painful ordeal.

After that his debate ceased and he decided to help Thor, if only to end his own pain and even if Thor could succeed on his own Loki didn't feel like being indebted to anyone.

Having made his choice Loki tapped Thor on the shoulder and when he looked over, gave a curt nod promising his assistance.

Thus assured of Loki's help, Thor placed his hand on the surface of the image and concentrated on his desires to help the humans and save them from the dragons. As soon as his palm made contact with the portal he froze and his eyes glazed over as if he was in a trance.

Loki, to whom such matters were simple to understand, knew that Thor's mind was now in Midgard and likely already conversing with the dragon. He gazed at the image of the dragon on the ice field and waited for the form of Thor to appear to begin the process of finding out if this dragon could save the realm from its kin. Moments later the sky was darkened by storm clouds and there was a single bolt of lightning that struck the ground.


	14. Chapter 14

Sorry that this took so long to publish but I was busy with life and had some motivational issues. I would like to thank everyone who has been kind enough to submit a review, as the feedback really does help. Before the chapter starts I would like to note that, while this part features Toothless very much, everyone's favorite talking fish bone will not be making his appearance for quite a few chapters as I still have to put in some more exposition in the next 1-2 chapters and after that will b Toothless' quest to find and kill Regina. With that said please enjoy, then review, chapter 14!

* * *

**Midgard 290 years ago**

**The ice sheet**

It was cold, but not unbearably so. The sun was up and having black scales was a nice thing right about now. He was lost in total darkness but was not unhappy about it, the darkness was pleasant, inviting even. He felt himself slip slowly out of touch with his environment as the smells and sounds drifted away. A few minutes later he was asleep on the ice with not a care in the world, except perhaps a strange feeling in his head that he couldn't quite place.

He was jolted awake by a bright flash followed almost at once by a loud _crack_ sound nearby. His eyes, which had snapped open with slit pupils quickly adjusted to the change in his environment. Where before it had been sunny and relatively warm, now there were dark clouds covering the horizon and as he looked around he noticed an odd phenomenon; there was a figure standing not more than five feet from him.

This new being seemed to be composed of a blue tinted light that was jagged at the edges and stood roughly twice as tall as the dragon.

It had the same general shape of the green being of mist that Regina had learned from but it lacked an evil aura.

Very so slowly it began to approach the, now alert, dragon and once it was close it stopped, sat down with its legs crossed, made eye contact with the dragon and spoke in a calming deep voice that would be impossible to ignore.

"Hello there young one, can you understand me?"

As he spoke the dragon went through a series of eye and facial movements that showed that he noticed that the electric figure was making noise but beyond that Thor was unable to detect any further intelligence.

Thor felt his heart fall a few notches as the minutes passed with the dragon doing nothing, it seemed as though this dragon undoubtedly possessed some intelligence but it was not even close to the levels that he had been expecting.

"All is not yet lost Thor, we might still have a chance to salvage this operation" The voice was that of Loki though it sounded very distant and a little weak, originating from Asgard. Before Thor could react he felt the firm touch of Loki's hand on his back and felt the god's power being forced into him and through him to his projection.

As the green light of Loki's magic began to cross through Thor's body it was mixed together with a larger portion of Thor's own power and the result was that the hand of the projection started to glow a turquoise color.

Without having the slightest clue as to what Loki was doing, but trusting their newly formed alliance, Thor made his projection reach out its hand and placed it on the, now growling, dragon's snout. The instant that the two touched the aura of power was absorbed into the dragon's head with a _hiss_ and it blacked out a few seconds later.

Tingling near his face, it slowly spread out over his head until it encompassed his skull. The feeling changed, gone was the slight oddity of the previous feeling and in its place was a sensation of sharp, deep, though tiny pricks of pain. The pain formed a circle around the innermost part of his skull but never went as severe as to be unbearable, that was until the line started to move towards the back of his skull. just as he became used to the stabs of pain they reached the back of his head and were replaced by another feeling, not exactly painful but nothing that could be described as pleasant either.

It felt as though there was a great weight pressing on his skull but the pressure was internal rather than external. This new experience didn't last long and stopped almost as soon as it started. The dragon thought that it was finally over, whatever _it _was but just as he came to that simple conclusion a large throb of pain traveled from the crown of his head to the base of his neck. It was intense and the poor reptile had started to succumb to the welcoming darkness of escape even before the pain reached his neck and by the time it did he was out like a candle in a tempest.

Thor watched over the dragon as the last of the magic sunk its way into the scaled skull. The dragon gave a few twitches, a brief flash of something sharp in his eyes and then it keeled over and moved with the rhythms of a deep sleep. Thor took full advantage of this brief, unwanted, delay to question Loki about what he had just done. Just as he was starting to withdraw from Midgard back into his physical body he heard Loki's voice in the same far off manner as before.

"Relax Thor; all I did was some reconfiguring of the dragon's brain to increase his ability to learn and overall mental abilities. I also changed the nature of the brain to that of a human/dragon mix, which should make it impossible for the Queen to track or control him. I don't know what his previous mental capabilities were before but they've just been boosted tenfold at the very least. Unfortunately it seems as though I've used too much of my power and I must rest for now, you must carry the burden of instructing this dragon about his mission alone. I wouldn't go into too many details other than stressing the importance of this hunt and maybe some general information about humans, as the message did mention a human partner. Aside from that the rest is up to you to decide."

Thor felt the pressure on his body disappear and muttered a quiet thanks as he knew Loki had gone to recover. He resolved himself to waiting until the dragon had regained its senses and took the time to really inspect the dragon to try to figure out how he was going to brief it on the mission in a quick but informative manner. During his contemplation of the dragon he noticed something odd about its form, physically it looked the same but looking deeper Thor finally realized what was bothering him was in fact a good thing.

"This is interesting, very interesting indeed. The situation might not be so hopeless after all, if _that_ is what I think it is. I must act quickly on this advantage and try to speed up his return to the awake world."

Thor placed his hand over the dragon's head and charged a small jolt of electricity in his finger. Just as he was about to jump the dragon awake something happened, as he had hoped it would.

A tiny pillar of lightning had risen out of the dragon's head when Thor's hand drew close enough to it. This was huge! A monumental discovery that would make the upcoming challenges that much simpler. It seemed that this dragon had been created with the addition of a weapon of enormous potential. Putting that knowledge away for the near future Thor proceeded to thump the dragon's head, sending a small jolt of electricity into his nerves to bring him back to wakefulness.

There was nothing but dark surrounding him and for all he cared it could've stayed that way for any length of time but alas luck did not seem to favor him as he was dragged from the peaceful darkness back to the harsh world of light and sensation with a slight prick on his head.

As he looked around at the current landscape he again beheld that odd blue figure and was on the verge of attacking it, going so far as to position himself in an offensive stance, when something very strange occurred.

It was as though his skin had been covered in a coating of some substance that had, until now, dulled his senses. The moment that he had shifted a _peeling_ sensation had started at the tip of what he knew to be his tail and started to progress rapidly up his body until it had run over every inch of his flesh. The strangeness continued but this time it was as if his mind was peeling, the only difference was that this peeling wasn't like losing anything. It was quite the reverse in fact; as the feeling got stronger it was as though his mind was expanding with every passing moment.

The light around him had barely changed but it was as though his entire world had been altered immensely. The changes took place slowly at first, an increase in his understanding of _self_, of what he was and who he might be able to become. The next change was frightening indeed as it was the concept of _purpose, _what was his purpose? Did he even have one? This was a scary time for he didn't know the answers to these questions and didn't know if there even were answers to be found.

The next few changes were focused on the external, firstly there was the notion that he was angry at the foreign creature that was standing in front of him. Previously the creature had simply been there it was neither good nor bad but then it had made him feel those unpleasant experiences, it was now classified as something to be removed. The only problem was that the more he thought about these violent acts, the more he began to see how unappealing they were. Sure this new _thing_ had approached him and even went so far as to touch him but other than that it had done nothing else hostile, nothing that would warrant any actions other then suspicion or perhaps a few wary glances. In fact the more he considered the figure in front of him the more he came to think that it might be able to provide some helpful information about some of these confusing changes. The final external addition was nothing as major as the previous ones; in fact it was so minor as to be written off as just a physical sensation. It was a slight _pull_ that was dispersed throughout his whole body, as if it was trying to go somewhere far away.

It was at this point that the most unsettling change occurred in his mind. Before that point in time all the confused emotions and various changes had simply been rattling around inside of his head, but now everything was coming to a cohesive close. Out of that torrent of information, changes, questions and general chaos came one single thought that grew until it ceased to be obscured by the surrounding madness. That thought lanced out of his mind with the force of a thunderclap, and though it made no sound it seemed to echo in the desolate landscape of the ice sheet.

_Yes, I can understand you!_

* * *

__Well that was chapter 14 hope you enjoyed Toothless' little ordeal to go from a near beast to the scaly black mass of attitude that we expect. The next chapter will be up sometime in the next 15 days. Please consider writing a review, thanks.


	15. Chapter 15

**AN:** Well, i just couldn't resist posting another update today. It's short but this seemed like a good place to end a chapter on so here it is. If I'm lucky I will be able to post another update very soon, please enjoy a short chapter 15

* * *

Thor heard the conformation but the dragon's mouth had not moved.

"Very interesting, to have the mental ability to force your statements upon a person of a higher realm, I can normally ignore the thoughts of those from the lower realms and do so often but you are truly something special dragon. It would seem that Loki has done his work well, now that you can understand me and reply in kind we can finally begin our conversation."

The dragon stayed quite while the strange figure was making those sounds that he was now able to understand as speech, a verbal attempt of communication. The dragon processed what he had heard and simply bobbed his head in what he hoped would come across as a sign of agreement then focused his gaze intently on the strange creature before him.

Thor began to speak in a slightly fast voice but kept himself under control so as to get his message across.

"Right then, no time to waste, let's begin, firstly you should know what you are, you and those of your kind are known as dragons. There are many different types and sub-species but that isn't the important bit, the important part is that all the dragons with the exception of you are currently doing terrible deeds in this realm. It is not their fault though as they are being controlled by a pure evil dragon known as the Queen. She and the other that are under her control were created by the joined efforts of me and another with the purpose of causing some misery in this realm but they have taken it too far and must be stopped. The problem is that in order to stop them the Queen must be killed and that is something that cannot be accomplished from the outside, thus I created you as a final attempt to destroy this threat to the world. You are the only one who can stop this rampage before it's too late."

At the conclusion of his speech Thor waited for the dragon to respond and waited and waited, finally it produced a few dismal sentences.

_Why should I, who was just created as a tool, risk my own life to kill a Queen dragon, who may or may not be evil and save a race that I know nothing of or even care about? You expect me to take on such a heavy and vague burden just like that? I refuse to assist you until you give me a valid reason or two as to why I should._

Thor was stunned, this wasn't going at all like he had hoped. He had expected some resistance to the idea of a search and destroy mission but he had never thought the dragon would refuse outright. He took several minutes to come up with an explanation that would hopefully convince the reluctant dragon that his mission was the right thing to do.

"From my own point of view the creation of the dragons started out as a way to inflict some humility on another member of my realm by causing some destruction in this one. The problem was that the dragons were secretly changed by my partner to wipe out the entire race of humans from this land. The truth of the matter is that right now I am taking to you from 290 years in the future and from here the results of the dragon attacks have wiped out most of the humans in the realm. I personally created you 300 years ago, ten years for you, to try and put a stop to the possible destruction of this world. Just recently I learned the full horror of what the dragons had done to the realm, how many innocent people they had killed and how strong their armies had become. Shorty after that I learned that you had been given life and sent back to just 10 years after the first dragons landed here and that you were also granted special qualities that could help save the world before the dragons' purged it of human life. Well regardless, you have chosen not to assist me; I guess that the humans will have to be put through a literal trial by fire to survive."

Thor let out a brief sigh before continuing.

"I suppose that I never thought of your feelings in the matter of wanting to help, I just assumed that you would instantly go along with my plans because you felt the same way that I did at the moment that I created you. I thought that you would share my desire to protect the humans, even if it meant killing scores of your own kind to do so."

The dragon, who had listened with disinterest the entire time, finally responded.

_Let me start by saying that this is in no way a solid "yes" but I will think about what you said. Now please leave, I find that your presence is distracting in the extreme._

With a defeated mindset Thor's personification turned its head to the clouds, bent its legs and jumped. There was a huge flash of light and a loud _boom_ that faded as it receded further into the distance. A few minutes later the clouds were gone and Thor was back to his physical body in Asgard, looking at the still projected scene of the black dragon lying motionless on the ice sheet.

* * *

In the next chapter I will be putting in some references to the book series of How to Train Your Dragon, nothing too heavy but enough to notice that it's there. Also from this point on things will start to pick up with very few chunks of exposition seeded throughout the chapters. Please review for faster updates.


	16. Chapter 16

**AN: **Well here's chapter 16, a bit longer and a bit darker than the previous one. As with the last chapter I am still writing the story so there will be at least one more update to come if not more in the next few hours/days. Please enjoy, and review, chapter 16

* * *

The dragon stayed in that same position, tail curled around him, for a long time. He was in fact doing a bit of self-reflection and thinking about the world that he had been thrust upon.

He was a dragon, perhaps the only "good" dragon anywhere in the world. Based on what the strange figure had told him he figured that he was smarter than most any other dragon as well. He had no one else to talk to, not that he wanted anyone, but it might be nice to just have another of his kind to converse with. He mentally shook his head trying to clear it, after all what was the reason for needing other living beings? What could they possibly provide him except more responsibilities that he didn't want?

He lay there in the cold snow, shielded by his scales' ability to absorb sunlight, for such a long time that the light in the sky faded and a darkness took the land, it wasn't as dark as he would have liked but it was darkness never the less. When the sunlight died he found that the cold was really setting in and that, combined with the turmoil in his head, caused him to get up and start pacing in various patterns.

He continued his pacing and thinking until the first rays of sunlight peeked over the isolated location. He twisted his head, facing the new day as his pupils shrank to compensate for the unwelcome light. He suddenly felt very tired and laid himself down to rest with his head between his forepaws.

He woke with a start, eyes popping and swiveling to and fro. A sound, there had been a sound.

He listened very intensely for a few minutes until he heard it again, _gurgle, _his sensitive ears quickly pinpointed the source and his head snapped down to point at his abdomen. He relaxed a little as he realized that it was his own body that had made the sound.

It was at this point that he noticed something that struck him as odd, the sunlight was coming from the same direction but it was much weaker than when he had fallen asleep.

_I must have slept through the whole light and darkness cycle and it is now the next light cycle, at least I hope that was as long as I was out for._

Another of those noises from his body refocused his attention on the problem at hand. He felt a slight pain in the region but it wasn't unbearable, when he focused his mind on the problem a solution presented itself to him. His body required some form of sustenance, something that was alive to keep him alive.

Without further delay he unfolded his wings, moved them experimentally a few times and eventually took off into the air.

Once the initial rush of accomplishment faded he remembered his purpose in taking flight, he needed to find nourishment in this seemingly dead place. Perhaps fueled equally by his need and his instincts, however repressed by his mind, his vision suddenly changed, what he saw was no longer the world as he remembered it. In that instant it was warped from a world of white and blue to a scene of dark purple and a variety of oranges with some small moving spots of red on the ground below. He briefly ducked his head under himself to inspect his body, where he expected to see that smooth darkness of scales he saw only a vibrant red smudge that got progressively closer to pink the farther away from his core he looked.

_Heat sensitive vision, what an advantage! I will be able to spot prey from any distance so long as they are not next to something else hot enough to mask their own heat._

Just as he was admiring the asset to his hunting ability he glanced back up and saw something that drove the thought of flying right from his head, it was as though all the white of the lower landscape had been lifted up into the sky and altered into what hung before him now; clouds. These clouds were not white however, no; they were black and carried a seemingly infinite weight to them. Just looking at the clouds made him want to be somewhere far away, huddled in confines of his own scales until the danger had passed.

There was no time for thought, no time for questions or clever statements; he simply did what his body told him to do. He jerked his wings closed and angled down towards the ground, when he landed he started digging franticly into a snow drift and then covered himself with his enormous wings just as the howling wind and freezing snow struck him.

He lost track of time as his world dissolved into the most primal of battles, the beast verses nature, a battle with nothing more than simple survival as its goal. The ballet lasted for long enough to convince the beast that he was going to lose and as a result, die here without ever being able to make an impact on the world, without a purpose.

As time progressed the dragon got colder and colder, he was all alone in the dark and the cold with nothing to look forward to and nothing to remember except the words of that blue figure that had wanted him to help another race even if it meant killing his own.

More time passed but he was unaware of it, all he could see was blackness and all he could feel was the cold slowly eating away at his malnourished form. It was then, on the brink of a forced sleep that would surely result in his death that he realized what it was like to be completely helpless to fight your own fate.

_This is torture beyond anything that one creature could do to another. No being should have to suffer like this, alone and helpless to escape their situation. _ _I think I now understand what that creature was trying to say, that the sacrifice of one's self is justified if it means assisting those who are alone and in the dark, unable to do anything but wait for their situation to sink its teeth into them for the last time. I finally understand! Here at the end I finally understand the desire to protect; this whole mess is so ironi-_

With that he fell into the frozen state that only the deepest of cold can cause and was trapped under the snow in a prison of cold.

Thor sat in his cell staring at the dragon who by this time had started to pace around the ground, carving deep impressions in the snow. He watched and tried to understand why the dragon had been so selfish and refused him. In the midst of his thoughts he was jolted back to reality by the presence of Loki, returning after his rest to check on the situation. Looking first at the wall and then at Thor Loki spoke.

"Well Thor, judging from the dragon's lack of flying and your happy mood I would guess that all did not go well. It's really too bad but I should have predicted this, after all you did use my blood in his creation did you not?"

Thor, who was still brooding over his failure merely nodded and continued to gaze at the dragon on the wall. Loki considered the current situation before continuing.

"I will hazard a guess that the dragon didn't take to the idea of _helping _others well and that the idea of _sacrifice_ wasn't overly appealing either. He is just like I was 300 years ago, selfish, arrogant, and cunning. Well if he won't help us as he is, we will simply have to encourage a little personality adjustment and fast, time is of the essence."

Thor, who had not really been listening suddenly stared up at Loki.

"What did you have in mind Loki? At this point I'm open to most anything."

Loki paused a minute, running his hand over the mark on his arm before responding.

"If he has my blood then he will have to learn the value of _life_ in the same fashion that I did, through the pain of his mind and body. We can't kill him but I think that I know of a way to accomplish that goal without inflicting lasting damage."

Thor took a moment to consider before agreeing to whatever Loki's plan was.

"You must create a storm, the likes of which you have never done before. It must be a highly concentrated storm with freezing cold temperatures, fierce winds and most importantly of all a few feet worth of snow. It will force the dragon to remain grounded, restrict his ground movement, and then when he has lost the will to keep fighting he will give himself up to 'nature' and be frozen solid by the cold. After he has been frozen the snow will bury him within its depths for maybe 10 years. In those 10 years he will either be able to think and ponder what it means to be helpless or he will be asleep with nothing but his own mind for company, either way he will grow to know the truly cruel fate of being unable to fight back. When the snow has melted enough he will be rescued by the native people that will have spread to those lands, they will most likely save him without realizing what he is and from there it is up to the two different races to settle their problems."

Thor considered Loki's plan, it was cruel and it would cost them 10 years of time but it was better to lose 10 years than to have the dragon refuse him for the next 100 years.

Having made up his mind Thor crossed to the wall and started to condense the clouds into the mightiest storm that land had ever seen. He hoped that it would be enough to secure the dragon's help with defeating the Queen.


End file.
